The newly identified corona virus SARS-CoV-2 aka COVID-19 has spread in many countries, caused far too many deaths and hospitalizations and become nearly impossible to ignore.
As scientists we can’t help but ask, how can I help? Can we build a better soap? Bring back a medieval protection device to help with the shortage of masks? Would the ozone from a high voltage corona discharge kill a corona virus?
What about that Star Trek episode where (spoiler) they cured an insanity epidemic by hitting Spock with intense UV light? Should we be distilling rubbing alcohol and making our own disinfectant mats for Irish rail like they did for the Hoof and Mouth epidemic?
All of that sounds too complicated so we’re going to do something simple and sciency to detect the virus so that we’ll know when to run away.
I know what you’re thinking, build a scanning electron microscope! Yes, that would be good craic and if we have the money, tools and know-how to do that in 36 hours, I’m on board. But I was aiming for something even simpler. You see, because viruses are teeeny weeny, comparable to the wavelength of light, visible light microscopes are almost worthless. But maybe we can use their wavelength-dodging optical properties. You guessed it again, we need:
Surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) detection of multiple viral antigens using magnetic capture of SERS-active nanoparticles. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23021841)
Eureka! Or is it duh!?
(Note: Magnetic capture with raman tweezers… is optional, all we need to do is detect it. Leave it as an exercise for other scientists to figure out how to blow it up.)
And who is going to calibrate it with a real COVID-19 sample? Not me. So that’s why I think we should begin with an HD-DVD based raman spectrograph and Vitamin A as the sample molecule. As in this:
HD DVD substrates for surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy analysis: fabrication, theoretical predictions and practical performance
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2016/ra/c6ra06029c#!divAbstract
WARNING!!!
This project is not qualified to detect COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2 Corona Virus, Corona Beer or anything. Anyone who believes viral epidemiology equipment, vaccines, pharmaceuticals or safe and effective scientific knowledge can be invented, vetted and qualified by various medical standards and safety organisations in 36 hours or even 15,000 hours should go back to school and be careful not to give any of the rest of us cooties. Seriously why is fake news so viral? This project is for fun sciency stuff and other good craic. Do not spread infodemics!
With that disclaimer out of the way…
What do we need?
- HD-DVD seems to have gone the way of the Betamax so we may have to substitute Blue-Ray.
- Ramen noodles and Corona beer and/or a source of Vitamin A.
- UV LEDs
- Inkjet or filter paper, gold or silver ink and a fountain pen!?
The concept is simple – arbitrary SERS-active Au and Ag nanoparticles were first loaded into the reservoir of any fountain pen, and were written (and deposited) onto photocopy paper with slight hydrophobicity. The results are SERS paper arrays coated with densely packed nanoparticles. The minimum dimension of the SERS array is dependent on the nib dimension of the fountain pen. In their case, a minimum spot size of 125 mm has been achieved. Using 0.2 mL of 3 mg/mL nanoparticle ink, 15 X 15 SERS arrays, with a total surface area of 0.9 cm2, have been prepared.
https://www.advancedsciencenews.com/pen-paper-diy-surface-enhanced-raman-spectroscopy-sensor/ - Lasers, blue, red, green, ultraviolet, infrared… (because, lasers!)
- Digital camera sensor and/or photodiodes, phototransistors, arduino…
- Lenses, prisms, mirrors, DVD, laserdisk and MEMs projector parts
- Vantablack 2.0 or 3.0 (Raman scattering is much dimmer than Raleigh scattering or laser reflection so we need dark surfaces in the optics.)
- Does anyone have a spare gold-sputterer? I left mine in my other pocket. Might have to make one: https://hackaday.com/2019/07/23/vacuum-sputtering-with-a-homemade-magnetron/
References:
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/pdf/10.1021/acssensors.8b00340
http://www2.optics.rochester.edu/workgroups/novotny/tweezer.html
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlehtml/2016/ra/c6ra06029c
https://hackaday.io/project/1279-ramanpi-raman-spectrometer
https://hackaday.io/project/19579-the-otter-diy-raman-spectrometer
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23021841
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780444531759000167
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2016/ra/c6ra06029c#!divAbstract
https://www.pnas.org/content/117/2/895
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/226688506_Tuning_Optical_Discs_for_Plasmonic_Applications
In case this particular method isn’t practical within our time and other constraints, how else can we detect the smallest beastie and/or the largest molecule with ordinary junque and kitchen tools?
https://www.theremino.com/wp-content/uploads/files/Theremino_Spectrometer_Technology_ENG.pdf
https://hackaday.com/2015/01/13/cheap-diy-microscope-sees-individual-atoms/
https://www.randox.com/covid-coronavirus-testing-randox/
