Microfluidic digital PCR enables rapid prenatal diagnosis of fetal aneuploidy.

OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to demonstrate that digital polymerase chain reaction (PCR) enables rapid, allele independent molecular detection of fetal aneuploidy. STUDY DESIGN Twenty-four amniocentesis and 16 chorionic villus samples were used for microfluidic digital PCR analysis. Three thousand and sixty PCR reactions were performed for each of the target chromosomes (X, Y, 13, 18, and 21), and the number of single molecule amplifications was compared to a reference. The difference between target and reference chromosome counts was used to determine the ploidy of each of the target chromosomes. RESULTS Digital PCR accurately identified all cases of fetal trisomy (3 cases of trisomy 21, 3 cases of trisomy 18, and 2 cases of triosmy 13) in the 40 specimens analyzed. The remaining specimens were determined to have normal ploidy for the chromosomes tested. CONCLUSION Microfluidic digital PCR allows detection of fetal chromosomal aneuploidy utilizing uncultured amniocytes and chorionic villus tissue in less than 6 hours.