**Digital Nucleic Acid Detection Based on Microfluidic Labon-a-Chip Devices**

Xiong Ding and Ying Mu

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/62742

#### **Abstract**

Microfluidic lab-on-a-chip (LOC) technologies have been developed as a promising alternative to traditional central laboratory-based analysis approaches over several decades due to the capability of realizing miniaturized multiphase and multistep reactions. In the field of nucleic acid (NA) diagnosis, digital NA detection (dNAD) as a single-molecular-level detection is greatly attributed to the perfect combination of NA amplification and microfluidic LOC techniques. In this chapter, the principle, classifi‐ cation, advances, and application of dNAD will be involved. In particular, the focus will be on chip-based dNAD for giving a deep interpretation of the analysis and evalua‐ tion of digital detection. The future prospect of dNAD is also anticipated. It is sure that dNAD by means of microfluidic LOC devices as the promising technique will better serve the ambitious plan of precision medicine through absolute quantitation of NA from individuals.

**Keywords:** digital nucleic acid detection, lab-on-a-chip, microfluidic chip, digital PCR, quantitation
