IIIT-A scientists develop faster, cheaper test kit
: A team of scientists at Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad, (IIIT-A) has developed a nanotechnology-based rapid testing kit for Covid-19. The kit could pave way for quicker and cheaper testing to detect Covid patients and even prove to be a replacement for the widely used RT-PCR tests, which cost more, say IIIT-A experts.
“The rapid diagnostic kit for novel coronavirus is being developed as part of a government of India’s department of biotechnology (DBT) funded one year project ‘Development of rapid detection kit for novel Coronavirus’ sanctioned in January this year. We have already developed a prototype of the kit and its trial for proper validation is now under way at KGMU, Lucknow,” said Amaresh Kumar Sahoo, assistant professor at department of applied sciences, IIIT-A, who is leading the efforts as the project’s principal investigator.
Other IIIT-A scientists actively involved in the project include prof Pritish Varadwaj, prof Krishna Misra and Sintu K Samanta. Tayyaba Afshan is working on this mission as a junior research fellow. “Prof Amita Jain, head, microbiology department,
KGMU, Lucknow is collaborating with us on this project,” he said. Sahoo said the kit being developed by them involves use of luminescent gold nanoparticle-based diagnosis of Covid that is performed within 15 minutes. “The viral RNA sample is detected by luminescent nanoparticles under UV-light illumination,” he said. “Each test using our kit would cost onefifth of the cost of an RT-PCR test. If an RT-PCR test costs Rs 1000, a test by our kit would cost Rs 200. While an RT-PCR test takes around 4 hours for the result, using our kit the result would come within 15 minutes,” said Sahoo. IIIT-A director Prof P Nagabhushan said validation of test kit developed by IIIT-A team being carried out at KGMU was under an MoU existing between the two institutions.