Abbott’s new $5, 15-minute, 50 million per month test is a game-changer This past week an eventful announcement came from Abbott Laboratories, manufacturer of several diagnostic platforms, including several already approved fro COVID-19 testing including amplification-based IDNow, and a few antibody automated systems, one prominent one being the Architect. Now […]
The experience of working to build something from nothing is invaluable. And I am happy to announce that I am now officially open for the next adventure in my own career. Announcement Number One: Moving On from Heligenics You read on this blog (it was only June 18, which you […]
GigaAssay technology spun out of the University of Nevada Las Vegas connects mutations to health Over the course of the past three months with school-aged children underfoot, there have been many opportunities to talk about what life was like when I was growing up and how that contrasts with life […]
It was about a year ago that I highlighted here some neat graphene technology out of Cardea Biosciences, and in that context I mentioned CRISPR-based diagnostics. (If interested, you can find the post here.) The FDA recently approved under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) Sherlock BioSciences’ SARS-CoV-2 Rapid diagnostic (FDA EUA […]
Research from a Washington State skilled nursing facility confirms over half did not show symptoms but are infecting others with SARS-CoV-2 In early March, this report in JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) was the first outside-of-China, peer-reviewed publication that documents asymptomatic spread. In brief: an otherwise healthy Shanghai […]
Thorough research on nine infected individuals in Germany shows important details on the natural course of SARS-CoV-2 infection, infectivity from an infected individual, and ability to detect the RNA via rRT-PCR, live virus assay, and neutralizing antibody testing It was about five years ago, starting at a new employer SeraCare […]
One of the first serosurvey results from Santa Clara county in California reports 48,000 to 81,000 people infected, 50-fold to 85-fold more than the number of confirmed cases. Living through a pandemic while under lockdown order, with schools and routines and social events and music concerts and movie theaters and […]
You will need to wear a mask for a while In this current worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, the head of the US Nursing Home Association has rightly called the SARS-CoV-2 virus ‘almost the perfect killing machine‘ for elderly patients. Compared to SARS-CoV (aka ‘SARS Classic’ circa 2003), it is clear that […]
Using both traditional blood draw and an innovative home-collection device, the NIH recruits 1000 healthy volunteers nationwide The SARS-CoV-2 virus (otherwise known as coronavirus, the causative virus of COVID-19 disease currently rampaging worldwide) is a difficult pathogen to battle. While clearing out my bursting-at-the-seams ‘downloads’ folder on my computer this […]
First preliminary results from widespread IgA/IgG SARS-CoV-2 resistance antibody testing in Heinsberg Germany Being an active research scientist or having a life science research background during a once-in-a-lifetime worldwide epidemic is a remarkable thing. Whether reading pre-prints on MedRxiv or looking into the latest news of the day or reading […]
The US FDA clears the first serology test for assessing infectious spread In many ways it is difficult to assess the passage of time while in a national shutdown. It was a little over a week ago that I wrote about the need for a good antibody test for SARS-CoV-2, […]
There is some reason in the US for optimism in the middle of this SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. I wrote earlier this week the absolute need for an antibody-based test for widespread public screening, to assess antibody responses to get a picture of who has been exposed to the virus and has […]
