Saliva-based diagnostic tool predicts disease risk without blood tests

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: What if a simple drop of saliva could foretell the risk of a stroke, the early onset of diabetes, or even mouth cancer? For Haritha George, who hails from

Thiruvananthapuram and recently earned her PhD in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Illinois Chicago, that question was not just theoretical - it became the life of her research.

At a time when healthcare systems around the world are trying to shift from reactive treatment to proactive care, Haritha’s work brings a possibility closer to reality. Her doctoral

project, titled ‘Intelligent Salivary Biosensors for Systemic Disease Risk Prediction,’ explored how biomarkers in saliva can be used to predict serious systemic diseases long before

symptoms appear. “After completing my bachelor’s from Kerala University and my master’s in biotechnology from West Bengal University in Kolkata, I worked in Dubai for a while. It was during

that time, that I met my mentor, Mathew T Mathew. When he received the NIH R01 multi-PI grant for research in salivary diagnostics, he was one of the principal investigators. He encouraged 

me to apply as a doctoral researcher under his guidance, and I got through. That’s how it all started,” says Haritha. In 2022, as the world began adjusting to the post-pandemic landscape,

Haritha George joined the University of Illinois Chicago’s College of Medicine Rockford campus to begin her research journey. “Our campus was a hub for saliva-based COVID testing. Being

surrounded by cutting-edge work in non-invasive diagnostics made me wonder if saliva, the same fluid we used to detect covid, could also reveal more about a person’s overall health?” she

says.