A system for automatic HPV typing via PCR-RFLP gel electrophoresis

The identification of the types of the human papillomavirus (HPV) that have infected a female patient provides valuable information as regards to her risk for developing cervical cancer. A widely used method for performing the above task (namely HPV typing) is PCR-RFLP gel electrophoresis. However, the conventional HPV typing protocol is error-prone and resource-ineffective due to lack of interaction between the phases involved in it. In order to treat these shortcomings, we introduce a novel HPV typing system that can be built upon widely available laboratory equipment. The proposed workflow of the system automates the task of HPV typing via PCRRFLP gel electrophoresis. The proof-of-concept of the proposed methodology is evaluated via an experiment that emulates the operation of the introduced system on a set of real HPV data.