  One of the biggest issues currently plaguing the field of medicine is the
lack of an accurate and efficient form of disease diagnosis especially in urban
settings such as major cities. For example, the two most commonly utilized test
diagnosis systems, the PCR and rapid test, sacrifice either accuracy or speed
to achieve the other, and this could slow down epidemiologists working to
combat the spread. Another issue currently present is the issue of viral
quantification or the counting of virions within a nasal sample. These can
provide doctors with crucial information in treating infections; however, the
current mediums are underdeveloped and unstandardized. This project's goals
were to 1) create an accurate and rapid RSV diagnostic test that could be
replicated and utilized efficiently in urban settings and 2) design a viral
quantification mechanism that counts the number of virions to provide more
information to healthcare workers. This diagnostic test involved a system that
pumped RSV-aggregated Au-nanoparticles and unaggregated Au-nanoparticles
through a microcapillary, whose cross-section was intersected by two laser
beams generating and detecting the nanobubbles. The signals between the
unaggregated and aggregated nanobubbles were calibrated, and the number of RSV
virions was recorded. The results yielded an accuracy of 99.99% and an average
time of 5.2 minutes, validating that this design is both faster and more
accurate compared to current tests. When cross-validated with Poisson
statistics, the virion counting system counted the number of virions with
98.52% accuracy. To verify the accuracy of our samples, the results were
compared to clinical trials of nasal samples, and our diagnostic system
predicted accurate diagnostics after statistical analysis. With further
testing, this diagnostic method could replace current standards of testing,
saving millions of lives every year.
