BillionToOne developed a novel qSanger-COVID-19 Test that is
Test reagents will be made
As World Health Organization assistant director general Dr. Bruce Aylward pointed out, effective quarantine is essential for tackling the coronavirus and this cannot happen without extensive testing for COVID-191.
The current US testing volume across all different methods is about 100,000 per day2.
1 "WHO expert: We need more testing to beat coronavirus" New Scientist article on March 16, 2020We believe to end the COVID-19 crisis, 10X more testing is needed in the US and other countries.
Virtually all the existing COVID-19 tests are qPCR based. Most qPCR instruments have low throughput (they can run 1- 48 samples at a time) and they all compete for the same reagents. The low throughput does not support the testing volume needed for COVID-19 response. The extreme surge in demand for the same reagents and instruments have caused multiple bottlenecks in the supply chain.
Our method relies on a Sanger sequencing-based molecular diagnostic for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2; COVID-19).
Sanger Sequencing is the most widely used sequencing method and was the method behind the Human Genome Project. The race to be the first to complete human genome sequencing forced the invention of high-throughput Sanger sequencers, which put the project ahead of schedule by nearly five years.
Using the patent-pending qSanger spike-in and proprietary machine learning algorithms, BillionToOne’s COVID-19 assay takes advantage of the 30X higher throughput Sanger sequencing capacity. Each Sanger instrument can automatically perform 3,840 tests per day, and there are hundreds of instruments available from the Human Genome Project alone. It only takes 260 instruments to reach 1 million/day testing capacity.
qSanger™️ technology unlocks >1M+ testing capacity per day by taking advantage of high-throughput Sanger sequencers developed for the Human Genome Project.
qSanger-COVID-19 test is easily adoptable at any labs with Sanger sequencers with minimum training. Test reagents will be made available in about 2 weeks to clinical laboratories, pending manufacturing of kits and Emergency Use Authorization from FDA.
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Work with us on COVID-19Please contact [email protected].