The maintenance of uric acid levels is crucial for the human body. In this study, the feasibility of using portable ultraviolet (UV) spectrophotometry to measure the uric acid of spot urine without the need to add reagents has been demonstrated for the first time. UV spectral analysis has been used to inspect the uric acid concentration in urine. It is found that the absorption spectrum of urine has a high correlation with the concentration of uric acid at a wavelength of around 290–300 nm. Uric acid levels measured with a spectral analyzer compared to uric acid concentrations measured with a traditional biochemical analysis showed good agreement. The portable prototype is label-free and capable of displaying the inspection result of each measurement within 10 s. In the long run, this device can assist people in checking uric acid levels of spot urine with higher frequency and can adjust diet or medication in real time for more efficient health management.

Adoptive T-cell therapy (ACT) requires the robust ex vivo expansion of functional T cells, but serum-containing culture systems, although supportive of proliferation, remain unsuitable for standardized clinical manufacturing. This study established a defined, serum-free culture platform that promoted effective CD8⁺ T-cell proliferation. CD3⁺ T cells were purified from mononuclear cells and cultured under various cytokine and medium conditions. Using fractional factorial screening followed by steepest ascent optimization, we identified an optimal 5-cytokine cocktail (Step 7 formulation: 30.8 ng/mL interleukin [IL]-2, 67.3 ng/mL IL-4, 40.3 ng/mL IL-7, 41.2 ng/mL IL-10, and 70 ng/mL IL-15), which markedly enhanced T-cell proliferation and increased the proportion of CD8⁺ T cells. Evaluation of basal media under serum-free conditions revealed that X-VIVO 15 effectively supported T-cell expansion in the presence of the cytokine cocktail. When insulin (4.39 µg/mL) was added to X-VIVO 15 together with the Step 7 cocktail, CD8⁺ T-cell proliferation reached levels comparable to those achieved in 10% fetal bovine serum cultures while maintaining serum-free conditions. This optimized system provides a reproducible and scalable platform for serum-free expansion of human T cells, supporting the manufacturing of ACT and chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapies. Graphical Abstract