# Point of care diagnostic for sickle cell disease

> **NIH NIH R18** · DUKE UNIVERSITY · 2024 · $179,818

## Abstract

Project Summary
Sickle cell disease (SCD) is severe hematological disease seen in Sub-Saharan Africa and the U.S., affecting
up to 3% of the newborn population Africa. In the US, the disease affects 100,000 Americans, but is
disproportionately borne by African Americans with one out of every 365 African-Americans affected. SCD
patients experience vaso-occlusive crises (VOCs) as acute bouts of pain. Currently, the only cure for SCD is a
bone marrow transplant but the cost and difficulty of this procedure results in SCD patients often choosing to
instead manage their disease with treatments and routine monitoring. However, there is currently no objective
measure or lab test to determine VOCs and associated pain severity. Routine monitoring of red blood cell (RBC)
health, however, could provide a window for avoiding VOCs and enable more thorough, quantitative analysis of
therapeutic interventions.
The goal of this project is to create a prototype device suitable for use at the point of care for monitoring SCD
patients by advancing a novel technology for rapid, automated, high throughput red blood cell (RBC) imaging.
The approach is based on quantitative phase imaging (QPI) to create a hologram of every individual RBC in a
sample. These imaging data can then be evaluated for the proportion of sickled cells using machine learning.
Further, since up to 10^6 RBCs are imaged in each sample, a large volume of data will be obtained, suitable for
developing AI algorithms that can reveal additional information. Significantly, the device is compact and low
cost, indicating that there is significant potential for translation to a point of care device. In this project, we will
seek to translate our technology, with demonstrated high throughput imaging capabilities, to realize a prototype
device suitable for use in clinical trials. They key development steps include development of the imaging device
to enable a robust, compact form factor, advancing the design of the microfluidic device that carries the RBC's
and creating new and improved algorithms to enable high throughput segmentation and analysis of the obtained
imaging data. The output will be a prototype device for assessing the RBC health of individuals based using a
small blood draw which can be analyzed locally to enable treatment decisions more quickly.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 11179696
- **Project number:** 3R18EB035004-01S1
- **Recipient organization:** DUKE UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Adam Wax
- **Activity code:** R18 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $179,818
- **Award type:** 3
- **Project period:** 2024-09-06 → 2026-07-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/11179696

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 11179696, Point of care diagnostic for sickle cell disease (3R18EB035004-01S1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-25 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/11179696. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*