Accurate molecular identification of different meat adulterations without carryover contaminations on a microarray chip PCR-directed microfluidic lateral flow strip device

Abstract

Meat adulteration-based food fraud has recently become one of the global major economical, illegal, religious, and public health concerns. In this work, we developed a microarray chip polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-directed microfluidic lateral flow strip (LFS) device that facilitates the accurate and simultaneous identification of beef adulterated with chicken, duck, and pork, especially in processed beef products. To realize this goal, four pairs of amplification primers were designed and applied for specifically amplifying genomic DNA extracted from mixed meat powders in microarray chip. With the prominent advantage of this device lies in the flexible combination and integration of sample loading, detection, and reporting in microstructures, all the DNA amplicons can be individually visualized on the LFS unit, leading to the appearance of test lines (TC line, TD line, TP line, or TB line) as well as the control line (C line) for the species identification and quantification in beef products. Based on this new method, the adulterants were successfully distinguished and identified in mixtures down to 0.01% (wt.%) while the carryover aerogel contamination in routine molecular diagnostic laboratories was effectively avoided. The practicability, accuracy, and reliability of the device were further confirmed by using real-time PCR as a gold standard control on the successful identification of 50 processed ground meat samples sourced from local markets. The method and device proposed herein could be a useful tool for on-site identification of food authentication.