A cheap cardboard centrifuge can separate plasma from blood in 90 seconds. The hand-powered Paperfuge was developed by Stanford bioengineer Man Prakash and can spin samples at 15,800 revolutions per minute (rpm). In contrast, a commercial StatSpin MP centrifuge takes up to two minutes to perform a plasma separation, at up to 125,000 rpm. Prakash was inspired by the design of a toy called a whirligig in making the device, which is a critical tool in the diagnosis of infections such as HIV and malaria.
A cheap cardboard centrifuge can separate plasma from blood in 90 seconds. The hand-powered Paperfuge was developed by Stanford bioengineer Man Prakash and can spin samples at up to 125,000 revolutions per minute (rpm). In contrast, a commercial StatSpin MP centrifuge takes up to two minutes to perform a plasma separation, at 15,800 rpm. Prakash was inspired by the design of a toy called a whirligig in making the device, which is a critical tool in the diagnosis of infections such as HIV and malaria.