A South Korean research team has pioneered a technology capable of diagnosing major neurological and psychiatric disorders using only a small sample of saliva.
The joint team—comprising experts from the Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS), Korea University’s Department of Bioengineering, and St. Vincent’s Hospital of the Catholic University of Korea—announced on the 6th the development of a diagnostic platform that identifies diseases such as epilepsy, schizophrenia, and Parkinson’s disease. Their findings were recently published in Advanced Materials, a premier international journal in the field of materials science.
Shifting from Invasive Scans to Salivary Analysis
Until now, diagnosing these conditions typically required invasive or high-cost procedures, including cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) taps, blood tests, or Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scans. PET scans, in particular, often cost over 1 million won and involve radiation exposure, while CSF and blood tests require the use of needles.
In response, the research team developed a simpler, non-invasive method that captures structural changes in proteins associated with brain diseases. In Parkinson’s disease, proteins such as amyloid-beta and tau accumulate in the brain. Similarly, epilepsy patients experience cellular stress and protein metabolism abnormalities due to frequent seizures, while schizophrenia patients often exhibit an inability to regulate amyloid-beta levels.
These altered proteins eventually enter the bloodstream and pass through the salivary glands into the mouth. By utilizing a proprietary protein signal amplification technology, the team can detect these subtle changes within saliva to facilitate a diagnosis.
High Diagnostic Precision and Future Potential
In clinical testing, the team compared saliva samples from 13 epilepsy patients, 21 schizophrenia patients, and 10 Parkinson’s patients against 23 healthy controls. The platform achieved an overall diagnostic accuracy of 93.9%. Specifically, it demonstrated a sensitivity (the ability to correctly identify those with the disease) of 93.2% and a specificity (the ability to correctly identify healthy individuals) of 96.7%.
Unlike traditional PET scans or CSF tests that measure the quantity of specific proteins, this new platform analyzes how much the structure of the protein has changed. This structural focus allows for high accuracy even with the minute protein concentrations found in saliva.
"Given that this platform is non-invasive and low-cost, there is significant potential for its application in both clinical settings and home diagnostic devices," said Professor Jeong Ho-sang of Korea University’s Department of Bioengineering.
The research team plans to refine the technology into a field-ready diagnostic device and move forward with commercialization. Furthermore, because amyloid-beta and tau are also primary biomarkers for Alzheimer’s, the researchers expect this technology to expand into the field of dementia studies.
