CRISPR/Cas Enabled Sweat Analysis Paving the Way for Non-Invasive Point-Of-Care Detection of Pathogens by Analyzing Cas12a Trans-Cleavage Performance in Human Sweat

Skin infections are prevalent health issues, affecting millions of people. However, traditional methods to diagnose them, like culture tests and Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), have limitations, such as the need for specialized labs and labor-intensive protocols. This study introduces Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeat-associated (CRISPR/Cas) based sensing in sweat as a novel approach, evaluating the ability of two Cas12a variants to detect specific DNA sequences in sweat samples. We achieve detection limits in the low picomolar range so that these results open pathways for non-invasive, rapid pathogen detection directly from sweat. We envision integrating this assay into wearable devices for real-time skin infection diagnostics, revolutionizing point-of-care testing.