GUWAHATI: Faculty members of IIT Guwahati (IIT-G) have developed a machine to detect the novel coronavirus. The Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) machine also detects other complicated viruses apart from COVID-19 in real time.
Reportedly, IIT Guwahati has provided two such PCR machines which have been installed at the GMCH for live screening of patients.
The said machine has the capacity to run for 12 hours continuously and can screen 2,000 samples in 24 hours.
It has been patented by the institute and is ready for commercialization. Further, portable organic field-effect transistor (OFET) sensors that have also been developed by the institute can also be integrated for the diagnosis of COVID-19.
IITG is also setting up an advanced research centre (BLS-III/IV laboratory) for the analysis of the virus.
TG Sitharama, Director of IIT-G, informed that the centre, when finished, would be a state-of-the-art facility in the entire northeast for diagnosis of different infectious diseases in the early stages of infection and their subsequent prevention.
The OFET sensors are being checked at a company for the detection of bacteria and can be utilized for the detection of viral RNA of coronavirus infected patients.
