Achira’s ACIX is a microfluidics based point-of-care (POC) platform consists of a fluorescence-based reader and microfluidic cartridges containing our patented hydrogel technology. Microfluidics has many advantages for medical test performance at the point-of-care. Due to miniaturization inherent to the platform, our hydrogel sensors use very low reagent volumes leading to economies of scale and affordability of tests. Sophisticated fluidics enables precisely controlled, rapid and multiplexed immunoassays with a small volume of blood or serum increasing the performance of POC tests. ACIX technology leverages its miniaturization and automated fluidics to develop products that deliver lab quality results for doctors office, lab and field testing.

The test principle involves embedding reagent-bound hydrogel sensors inside a microfluidic cartridge. These sensors interact with analytes from samples and fluorescently labelled secondary reagents Assays are performed in a flow-through format by loading the sample-containing chips into a small portal desktop reader that automates flow and incubation steps before readout by sensitive fluorescence detection.

Achira’ USelect Technology is a patent-protected technology that can help improve pregnancy outcomes in the IVF industry. Each year, over 2.5 million IUI procedures are performed annually in India. Although it is a low-cost process compared to techniques like IVF and ICSI (Intra Cytoplasmic Sperm Injection), IUI has poor success rates in pregnancies compared to these two methods. Achira has developed, in collaboration with Dr. Vasan at Ankur Fertility, a kit and process to isolate sperms more likely to bind to oocytes to improve fertilization outcomes for IUI and other IVF procedures like ICSI.

A magnetic bead technology is used to bind functionally competent sperms before eluting them out. This method was designed and developed for isolation of millions of functionally competent human sperms. It has been put through extensive in vitro testing followed by a pilot clinical study on 60 patients. The study demonstrated a 24% pregnancy success rate which is much higher than conventional DG and SU techniques (11-18%). The USelect Technology is a simple technique that does not involve repeated centrifugation like the competing Swim-Up and Density Gradient methods, and yields sufficiently high count of mature sperms.

Clinical Outcomes: Over 100+ patients have now benefitted from USelect performed at multiple sites, with multiple live births.

• 44% increased pregnancies compared to Swim-up (SU) during IUI study performed
• Mean DFI was significantly lower with USelect when compared to unprocessed, poor samples
• Sperm isolated using SU and DG had 1.6 and 3 times less HA binding efficiency (a key indicator of sperm maturity)

Achira has developed a revolutionary new fabric-based technology to perform lateral flow and electrochemical assays. Using our patented approach, yarn coated with reagents is woven into fabric that can be cut into strips and packaged to make individual or multiplexed test sensors. Strips of this fabric can then be cut out to perform simple, capillary flow based tests. The inherent scalability of the textile manufacturing process can lead to significant cost savings and ease of manufacturability. The uniqueness of the fabric platform lends itself easily to low resource settings, easy to make through single step assembly process with the potential of using local skills and networks. Achira has partnered with community organizations to weave and assemble skills at the point of care with the aim of generating employment and increasing local availability of tests.

Electrochemical sensors

We have built a textile weaving based platform for the manufacture of electrochemical sensors, which has several advantages over existing techniques. Here, yarns that have been pre-coated with conducting inks and reagents, are woven into fabric at the required location to mass manufacture sensors in a single step (Fig. 1). In contrast to screen-printed sensors, yarn coating can be carried out with exactly the required volume of reagents and inks resulting in lower costs and lower environmental damage.

Immunosensors

Achira has also built lateral-flow immunosensors on the fabric platform. The main advantage over nitrocellulose membranes is that the entire assembly, including conjugate reagents, test and control lines as well as absorbing membranes can be assembled in one step on a loom. The properties of the absorbing medium can be tuned by changing yarn, weaving style and coatings.

ii. Our published work on fabric technology: The following papers have already been published by us on the fabric platform, giving it a solid scientific foundation enabling further product development. Immunosensors (1), electrochemical sensors (2,5) and SERS (3, Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy) sensors have all been demonstrated on the fabric platform.

Publications:

1. 1. ‘Fab-Chips’: a versatile, fabric-based platform for low-cost, rapid and multiplexed diagnostics; P Bhandari, T Narahari, D Dendukuri; Lab on a Chip 2011, (15), 2493 - 2499.
2. 2. Woven electrochemical fabric-based test sensors (WEFTS): a new class of multiplexed electrochemical sensors; T Choudhary, GP Rajamanickam, D Dendukuri; Lab on a Chip, 2015, (9), 2064-2072.
3. 3. The development of “fab-chips” as low-cost, sensitive surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) substrates for analytical applications; AM Page 3 of 10 Robinson, L Zhao, MYS Alam, P Bhandari, SG Harroun, D Dendukuri, et al.; Analyst, 2015, 140 (3), 779-785.
4. 4. Electrically Actuated Valves for Woven Fabric Lateral Flow Devices; T Narahari, D Dendukuri, SK Murthy; Analytical chemistry, 2017, 89 (8), 4671-4679.
5. 5. Wearable Woven Electrochemical Biosensor Patch for Non-invasive Diagnostics; A Modali, SRK Vanjari, D Dendukuri; Electroanalysis, 2016, 28 (6), 1276-1282.