In the edition of 4 April of the “Informe Semanal”, weekly in-depth news show of the RTVE, Prof. Laura Lechuga presented CoNVaT, the European funded project that she leads, which aims at the development of a fast, cheap and handy test device for the diagnosis of the COVID-19.
The “Informe Semanal” news show of the RTVE (Radio y Televisión Española) on 4 April dedicated an extended reportage to the COVID-19 infection and the various lines of research in which scientists all over the world are involved to find a cure, engineer a vaccine and design fast and cheap tests for its diagnostics. Spain is putting effort in all these challenges, with research groups racing against time to produce results that could have an impact on the current pandemics and on possible future coronavirus diseases.
On the diagnostics front, the reportage presented the CoNVaT project, headed by Prof. Laura Lechuga, leader of the ICN2 NanoBiosensors and Bioanalytical Applications group, and funded by the European Union through a special COVID-19 call. As Prof. Lechuga (CSIC) explains, her group is working on developing a new system for the diagnosis of the COVID-19, which would be much faster, cheap and easy to perform than the current polymerase chain reaction (PRC) test, which takes many hours, is expensive and can be analysed only in specialized laboratories.
The biosensor platform, based on optical nanotechnology, that Prof. Lechuga’s team is developing will also allow monitoring the evolution of coronaviruses in animals so as to predict and possibly prevent new outbreaks and future pandemics. As highlighted by Prof. Lechuga in the interview, this unfortunate situation should teach people and governments to listen more to scientists and their warnings.
