Hydrogel biochip for antibodies detection

Patent number: 2746815

Authors: Vladimir Valuev-Elliston, Dmitry Grydunov, Alexander Ivanov, Arvo Leinsoo, Elena Savvateeva, Marina Filippova

Patent owner: Engelhardt Institute of Molecular Biology

The problem with most of the initially developed tests for detection of SARS-CoV-2 virus was low accuracy. Unfortunately, those tests often “confused” the virus that causes coronavirus infection with other viruses, such as influenza. As a result, a healthy person or a patient not affected by COVID-19 could get into the hospital ward with patients having a coronavirus infection.

Also, those tests failed to assess the severity of the ongoing disease. It created a problem as well, because in the situation where the hospitals were overwhelmed, it was unreasonable to keep patients with mild forms of the disease in the hospital.

Scientists from the renowned Engelhardt Institute of Molecular Biology have developed a technology which ensures accurate diagnostic results and allows to assess the severity of the ongoing coronavirus infection. It is a multifunctional hydrogel biochip that contains viral proteins and special markers.

When a sample of blood serum interacts with the hydrogel biochip, specific protein immune complexes are formed. They can be used to accurately identify the virus that affects the patient and to determine the severity of the disease.

Another benefit of this technology is that accurate diagnostic results can be obtained even without the use of X-rays or CT scan of the lungs.