BME.01 – Development of Oral Brush for Genomic Analysis

• Timothy Leong
• Muzaffar Muhammad
• Tanzeem Rahman
• Asad Rizwan
• Ali Thahab

The oral cavity is the gateway to studying and preventing diseases such as oral cancer by discovering prevalent or predisposing factors as well as determining whether a tumor is malignant or benign without biopsy. However, a lack of tools to properly sample the region forced researchers to use unoptimized tools such as a Pap smear brush. This brush lacks the flexibility and softness required to avoid puncturing the oral tissue leading to the possibility of blood contamination in the sample. By creating a brush for genomic analysis, cells can be collected optimally and non-invasively from the oral mucosa. Our work focuses on finding the ideal material and manufacturing technique for the oral brush. Following flexible material research, we found that the ideal material should have an elastic modulus of 9.039 MPa. A material with that elastic modulus does not exist, therefore, the best material was determined to be low-density polyethene (LDPE) with an elastic modulus of 228 MPa. To decrease the risk of injury upon the patient without sacrificing the cell collection yield, our brush will be made with LDPE. A lower elastic modulus allows more deformation given a certain pressure is exerted. This decreases the amount of force necessary to impart on the brush, and decreases the injury risk to the patient, while the increased deformation will increase the surface area of the brush bristle in contact with the patient’s oral cavity, maintaining cell collection yields. We will verify that our brush has increased flexibility by bristle deflection angle (15 ± 5°). Through this effort, we designed a more flexible oral sampling brush to optimize oral genomic analysis by improving the cell collection process leading to more accurate results allowing researchers to predict prognosis of certain diseases and determine the status of tumors in the oral cavity.