June 2020
5
BIOTECHNOLOGY
HudsonAlpha Joins Forces with iCubate, By Lori J. Connors / Photos by HudsonAlpha iRepertoire, Huntsville Hospital and the Local Community in its Fight Against COVID-19 The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases continue to grow. Globally, the count is quickly approaching the 5 million mark. In the United States, the numbers are equally disturbing at 1.5 million. In Alabama, there have been more than 11,200 with Madison County inching toward 300 confirmed cases by mid-May. Yet, there are no treatment protocols and a vaccine has yet to be developed. Reliable testing has its limitations with regards to quality, quantity, and time. As COVID-19 continues to impact our world, great things are developing at HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology. Revolutionary, in fact. Scientific researchers, along with the area’s medical community have joined forces in the effort to understand and combat this insidious virus. At the core of this collaboration is HudsonAlpha and Huntsville Hospital,
along with iCubate and iRepertoire, two diagnostic technology companies on the HudsonAlpha campus. Through learning how the human immune system responds to a virus, HudsonAlpha and iRepertoire are studying local patients with COVID-19 under a Huntsville Hospital IRC approved protocol. “We set up a collaboration with Huntsville Hospital and it’s just getting started,” said Dr. Rick Myers, president and scientific director at HudsonAlpha. “Huntsville Hospital is a key player Dr. Rick Myers, president and scientific director in all of this. It’s at HudsonAlpha really important to get blood samples from people who have been infected - on the same day the blood has been drawn and to do the ex-
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periment.” “By understanding the immune system of patients that have effectively fought the pathogen, we can pinpoint the exact identity of Dr. Jian Han, iRepertoire founder and cells that effecchief scientific officer tively eliminate the virus out of millions of possibilities,” said Dr. Jian Han, iRepertoire’s founder and chief scientific officer. “The research to measure the immune system and develop an antibody and use it against an infectious agent, in this case SARS CV2, that type of research has been going on a decade at HudsonAlpha with Dr. Han and his group,” Myers, said. “When COVID started hitting, we started working on developing this approach.”
Although testing for COVID-19 is available, demand far exceeds supply. Along with limited availability, there are other shortcomings, such as accuracy and speed: both factors critical to minimizing the spread of the virus. iCubate recently rolled out its iCCOVID19 Assay diagnostic test. By targeting specific genes of the SARSCoV-2 virus, the Assay is specifically designed to test people demonstrating symptoms. Results are quick, with a turnaround of less than six hours from the time of sample collection. HudsonAlpha has responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by conducting significant research to better understand how the virus operates. Scientific research is not free; fundraising initiatives were quickly put into place. As a result, the community enthusiastically responded. As a part of #GivingTuesdayNow, $5,000 was raised in just five days, all in the name of COVID-19 research. w