Esophageal cancer is often diagnosed only at advanced stages, mainly due to the lack of early clinical symptoms. Therefore, we wanted to develop a detection system that must quantitatively detect small amounts of a tumor marker. While we were working on this topic, we developed a project idea, but it has much broader applicability.
We want to develop a qualitative detection system that can not only detect smallest amounts of tumor markers, but also viruses or other antigens. By replacing only one component of our system, a different antigen can be detected, making it universally applicable.
The main idea is a three-stage cascade for improved signal detection. The system is to consist of three components:
Detection: scFv fragments
Reporter: FRET system
Amplification: inteins