Rapid Antigen Detection Tests Empowered by Cholesteric Spherical Reflectors for Expanded Capabilities
Abstract
While Rapid Antigen Detection Tests (RADTs) have proved their value in point-of-care detection of respiratory diseases, their poor-contrast readout limits their use at early stages of infection where viral concentrations are low, and most RADTs test only for one disease, leaving a sick patient ignorant in case of a negative result. We explore the potential of Cholesteric Spherical Reflectors (CSRs) as enhanced optical labeling probes for RADTs, leveraging their circularly polarized reflections to maximize contrast by background subtraction and thereby lower the analyte concentration required for detection. Moreover, we demonstrate how the ease in tuning the CSR reflection color and the freedom to choose between right- and left-handed circularly polarized reflection allow us to design CSRs to distinguish optically between multiple diseases, eventually enabling RADTs capable of screening for a set of multiple diseases in a single test. We develop a method for functionalizing CSRs with appropriate antibodies and we propose a new type of RADT specifically designed for use with CSRs as detection label, demonstrating that the comparatively large size of CSRs (tens of microns in diameter) does not prevent viral analytes to tether them to an antibody-coated test surface. The strength of the optical CSR signal quantitatively reflects the antigen concentration.
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BibTeX
@misc{chien2026rapid,
title = {{Rapid Antigen Detection Tests Empowered by Cholesteric Spherical Reflectors for Expanded Capabilities}},
author = {Chih-Chieh Chien and Yan-Song Zhang and Jean-François Conrotte and Carole L. Linster and Sivashankar Krishnamoorthy and Jan P. F. Lagerwall},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2611.09948},
eprint = {2611.09948},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.09948},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Rapid Antigen Detection Tests Empowered by Cholesteric Spherical Reflectors for Expanded Capabilities
AU - Chih-Chieh Chien
AU - Yan-Song Zhang
AU - Jean-François Conrotte
AU - Carole L. Linster
AU - Sivashankar Krishnamoorthy
AU - Jan P. F. Lagerwall
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/11/01
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2611.09948
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.09948
AB - While Rapid Antigen Detection Tests (RADTs) have proved their value in point-of-care detection of respiratory diseases, their poor-contrast readout limits their use at early stages of infection where viral concentrations are low, and most RADTs test only for one disease, leaving a sick patient ignorant in case of a negative result. We explore the potential of Cholesteric Spherical Reflectors (CSRs) as enhanced optical labeling probes for RADTs, leveraging their circularly polarized reflections to maximize contrast by background subtraction and thereby lower the analyte concentration required for detection. Moreover, we demonstrate how the ease in tuning the CSR reflection color and the freedom to choose between right- and left-handed circularly polarized reflection allow us to design CSRs to distinguish optically between multiple diseases, eventually enabling RADTs capable of screening for a set of multiple diseases in a single test. We develop a method for functionalizing CSRs with appropriate antibodies and we propose a new type of RADT specifically designed for use with CSRs as detection label, demonstrating that the comparatively large size of CSRs (tens of microns in diameter) does not prevent viral analytes to tether them to an antibody-coated test surface. The strength of the optical CSR signal quantitatively reflects the antigen concentration.
ER -