UW DEPARTMENT OF CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING
Current Projects
Home Lab Group CEE Home UW Home Search UW
Detection of Emerging Microbes
Corona

A novel coronavirus (CoV) has been determined to be the etiologic agent for the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, SARS, following a concerted effort by the international scientific community in the Spring and Summer of 2003. The tangible public fear and economic consequences arising from the outbreak highlight the need for rapid detection methods, epidemiological tracking of the outbreak, and outbreak containment.

The goal of the SARS detection project is to develop a microarray-based detection method for SARS-CoV using the technology platform now being used for the Oral Chip diagnostic array. Key developmental steps include: identification of appropriate diagnostic sequences in the SARS-CoV genome, design of DNA probes, validation of probes with reference nucleic acids, and testing of probes with clinical samples.

The major goal of the SARS-CoV chip will be to rapidly identify new SARS-CoV infections. It may also be used to assess viral diversity between and among different CoV species, a key tool in epidemiological tracing of the virus and identifying the natural reservoir of the virus.

Back