Anna Mazhorova earned this honour from the Fonds Nature et Technologies for her article Label-free bacteria detection using evanescent mode of a suspended core terahertz fibre, published in Optics Express, Vol. 20, No. 5, 2012, p. 5344-5355.

According to the abstract, she proposed a new E. coli bacteria sensor based on the evanescent field of the fundamental mode of a suspended-core terahertz fibre. The sensor is capable of E. coli detection at concentrations in the range of 10⁴-10⁹ cfu/ml. The polyethylene fibre features a 150-µm core suspended by three deeply sub-wavelength bridges in the centre of a 5.1-mm-diameter cladding tube. The fibre core is biofunctionalized with T4 bacteriophages which bind and eventually destroy (lyse) their bacterial target.

Using an environmental scanning electron microscope, she demonstrates that E. coli is first captured by the phages on the fibre surface. After 25 minutes, most of the bacteria is infected by phages and then destroyed with fragments of about 1 μm remaining bound to the fibre surface. The bacteria-binding and subsequent lysis unambiguously correlate with a strong increase of the fibre absorption. This signal allows the detection and quantification of bacteria concentration. The presented bacteria detection method is label-free and does not rely on the presence of any bacterial “fingerprint” features in the THz spectrum.

The competition aims to recognize excellence in research carried out by college and university students, post-doctoral interns and members of professional orders who are taking advanced research training, in all the disciplines covered by the three Fonds, while also promoting research careers in Québec.

Once a month, each of the Fonds gives a $1,000 award to a student researcher. To see the summaries of the productions and the photos of the other winners, visit www.frq.gouv.qc.ca.

Our heartiest congratulations to Ms. Mazhorova!

The winner's photo comes from the Fonds de recherche du Québec website.