Device and method for high-throughput quantification of MRNA from whole blood

A method of detecting an abnormal response of cells from a subject to a bioagent, comprising:

• a) exposing the cells from a subject to the bioagent thereby forming exposed cells;
• b) lysing the exposed cells in step (a) with a lysis buffer comprising a known quantity of a standard mRNA thereby forming a first lysate;
• c) lysing cells unexposed to said bioagent from the subject with said lysis buffer thereby forming a second lysate;
• d) purifying poly-A mRNA from the first lysate and poly-A mRNA from the second lysate of each of step (b) and step (c) and forming purified poly-A mRNA from the first lysate comprising said standard mRNA and purified poly-A mRNA from the second lysate comprising said standard mRNA;
• e) producing cDNAs from a specific mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the first lysate and said purified poly-A mRNA from the second lysate and producing cDNAs from the standard mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the first lysate and in said purified poly-A mRNA from the second lysate;
• f) quantifying the amount of the standard mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the first lysate and the amount of the standard mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the second lysate from the cDNAs of the standard mRNA produced in step e), and quantifying the amount of the specific mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the first lysate and the amount of the specific mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the second lysate from the cDNAs of the specific mRNA produced in step e);
• g) quantifying the amount of said specific mRNA from the exposed cells and the amount of said specific mRNA from the unexposed cells from the cDNAs of the specific mRNA produced in step e) based on dividing the amount of the specific mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the first lysate by the percent recovery of the standard mRNA in said lysis buffer of step (b) and dividing the amount of the specific mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the second lysate by the percent recovery of the standard mRNA in said lysis buffer of step (c) respectively, and creating an adjusted data pair of the amount of said specific mRNA of the exposed cells and the amount of said specific mRNA of the unexposed cells,
• wherein said percent recovery of the standard mRNA in said lysis buffer of step (b) is calculated by dividing the amount of the standard mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the first lysate by the known quantity of said standard mRNA in said lysis buffer of step (b) and said percent recovery of the standard mRNA in said lysis buffer of step (c) is calculated by dividing the amount of the standard mRNA in said purified poly-A mRNA from the second lysate by the known quantity of standard mRNA in said lysis buffer in step (c);
• and
• h) comparing said adjusted data pair of the amount of said specific mRNA of the exposed cells and the amount of said specific mRNA of the unexposed cells with a range of known data pairs of the amount of said specific mRNA of the exposed cells and the amount of said specific mRNA of the unexposed cells, wherein said abnormal response of the cells to said bioagent is detected when said adjusted data pair of the amount of said specific mRNA of the exposed cells and the amount of said specific mRNA of the unexposed cells is not within two standard deviations of said range of known data pairs of the amount of said specific mRNA of the exposed cells and the amount of said specific mRNA of the unexposed cells.