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The unprecedented Covid-19 pandemic has created an urgent need for new knowledge generation and its application at multiple levels in clinics. The basic and clinical scientists at ACTREC- Tata Memorial Centre have been at the forefront to advance our understanding of the evolution of the COVID-19 virus using genomics approaches, develop diagnostics, and therapeutics against the disease.
The Dutt lab at ACTREC developed a real-time RT PCR-based one-step, one-tube, multiplex diagnostic kit to detect the COVID-19 virus kit along with a platform independent automated COVID qPCR analyser. This kit was succesfully transferred to industry through an institutional MOU. Several labs, including the Suraksha Diagnostic Pvt Ltd, Genetic Lab SRL, Genes N Life Health Care Pvt Ltd., and the Univ of British Columbia, Canada The Univ Hospital of La Réunion, France, for academic purpose, downloaded to use the automated COVID qPCR analyser. This kit is the first peer-reviewed RT-PCR kit developed at ACTREC, published in Heliyon, 2020.
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Similar to the Israeli- developed a one-minute breathe analyzer to detect coronavirus, the Dutt lab in collaboration with Chilakapati lab and Shilpee lab at ACTREC developed a proof of principle study to detect RNA virus in saliva using Raman Spectroscopy in few seconds that can be performed in the field using hand held Raman Spectrometers. They also developed an algorithm in the form of an automated tool, “RVD: RNA Virus Detector” using a GUI interface
for analysis that is currently already been used in 30 different labs across the globe. Journal of Biophotonics, 2020
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The Dutt lab at ACTREC developed an integrated approach (a computational tool) to determine the abundance, mutation rate and phylogeny of the SARS-CoV-2 genome. A researcher can either upload sequence to the IPD server hosted at ACTREC or download the tool and perform bulk analysis to generate automated reports. This tool is currently been used by over 40 groups across the globe. Using the IPD tool, the group performed a comprehensive analysis of 2.58M mutations from more than 200K samples and presented several interesting insights into the evolution of the SARS-CoV-2 genome. Briefings in Bioinformatics, 2021; and, BMC Bioinformatics, 2021
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The Prasanna Lab at ACTREC showed that the polybasic site and the RBD domain of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, seem to have evolved along the lines of feline coronavirus spike protein providing substantial evidence for the domestic cat as a possible intermediary host during the zoonotic transfer of the SARS-CoV-2 . They present a fresh, theoretical perspective on the SARS-CoV-2 virus activation and its intermediary host. Biochemistry and Biophysics Reports, 2021
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