A Handheld Reader with Optimized Image Analysis for HIV Lateral Flow Test.

As a rapid, simple and low-cost diagnostic technology, immunochromatography has a wide range of application in point-of-care testing (POCT). Here, a handheld reader based on image analysis was developed for the detection of HIV in serum or whole blood sample using gold colloid lateral flow strips. The control and test lines from the image of the strip collected by the reader were extracted with an image analysis algorithm including image preprocessing (image crop, grayscale of image, image equalization, median filter and image denoise) and feature extraction. Based on the preprocessed image, the control line was located based on its color difference from the background, and the test line was accurately identified with both preliminary searching and precise boundary location. The performance of the reader was evaluated by experiments using a series of different concentration of HIV serum samples. Comparing to the commercial reader, comparable performance could be achieved with the handheld reader with significantly reduced size.