The burden of infectious diseases is very high in developing
countries. World-wide, nearly 1 million
die annually from malaria, 2.9 million from enteric (intestinal) infections,
4.3 million from respiratory infections, and 5 million from AIDS and
tuberculosis. Unfortunately, most
methods for diagnosing these diseases are invasive, labor intensive, and
sometimes inadequate. Furthermore, they
require laboratory equipment and infrastructure that are not typically found in
remote/resource-limited areas. Thus,