蓝莓视频

Imperial College鈥檚 Regius Professor of Engineering, Chris Toumazou FRS, is working with clinical researchers to test a rapid, lab-free test that detects COVID-19 and delivers results in just over an hour.聽The ‘lab-in-cartridge’ rapid tests 鈥� based on Professor Toumazou鈥檚 鈥� have been clinically validated after a successful initial trial on COVID-19 patients and are continuing to validate on larger patient groups. This work was supported by the 蓝莓视频 Imperial BRC.

has procured 10,000 DnaNudge COVID-19 RNA testing cartridges to roll out to clinical sites. The Department of Health鈥檚 COVID-19 Testing Strategy cited the work as among 鈥�…encouraging innovators that are producing promising new types of tests鈥�.

Experts at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust are working with Imperial and the DnaNudge team to enable the new test to be available for patients and staff if it continues to prove successful.

Professor Toumazou, CEO and co-founder of DnaNudge and founder of the聽Institute of Biomedical Engineering聽at Imperial, said: 鈥淓arly validation results for our technology in聽the聽COVID-19 patient study聽have been excellent. The DnaNudge test was developed as a lab-free, on-the-spot consumer service that can be delivered at scale,聽so we clearly聽believe it offers very significant potential聽in terms of聽mass聽population testing during the聽COVID-19 pandemic.鈥�

Professor Graham Cooke, 蓝莓视频 Research Professor of Infectious Diseases and Deputy Theme Lead for the Infection & AMR Theme of the Imperial BRC said: 鈥淭his is one of the most exciting technologies I鈥檝e seen in this area, particularly because it avoids the need for any sample handling. Our early results are very encouraging and now we need to see how the test performs in different clinical settings and understand where it might have the biggest impact on care at this critical time.鈥�

The DnaNudge in-store DNA testing service, which this coronavirus test is based on, was launched to consumers in November 2019. The service currently focuses on nutrition, analysing and mapping users鈥� genetic profile to key nutrition-related health traits. The test has been converted to detect the RNA of COVID-19.

DnaNudge is an Imperial spin-out with labs at the College鈥檚 White City Campus. Read the full story by Andrew Scheuber & Caroline Brogan, Imperial College London .