The Weather Channel India Profile picture
Sep 22, 2020 17 tweets 6 min read Read on X
#Feluda: All You Need to Know about India’s Newly-Approved #COVID19 Test

weather.com/en-IN/india/co…

(Representational Image: Yawar Nazir/Getty Images)

#covid19 #coronavirus
#Feluda, a low-cost, indigenously developed testing method that can detect the novel coronavirus accurately in less than 30 minutes, has been approved for commercial use by the Drugs Controller General of India.
#COVID19 tests that are currently being used take longer time for diagnosis, leading to delays. However, Feluda significantly reduces the diagnostic time, which will come in handy considering the nationwide COVID-19 case tally has been consistently rising at an exponential rate.
What is Feluda and how does it work?

#Feluda stands for FNCAS9 Editor Linked Uniform Detection Assay. The name is also a tribute to Satyajit Ray’s well-known fictional character of the same name—a private detective in a series of Bengali novels.
The test uses indigenous #CRISPR gene-editing technology to recognise and target the genetic material of SARS-CoV2, the virus responsible for #COVID19.
#CRISPR—an acronym for Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats, a gene-editing technology—is used to fix gene defects.
This technology identifies a specific DNA sequence within the gene, and then, an enzyme acting as a molecular scissor is used to cut off the DNA sequence, thereby changing the DNA and tweaking gene function.
The #COVID19-causing coronavirus is detected by CRISPR tests that use CAS12 and CAS13 proteins for diagnosis.
#Feluda is also the world’s first diagnostic test to use a specially adapted Cas9 protein for the successful detection of the virus. The Cas9 protein is coded in a way that makes it interact with the SARS-CoV2 sequence present in the patient’s genetic material.
Then, this Cas9-SARS-CoV2 complex is put on the paper strip with two lines—one control, one test—which help confirm or deny the viral infection.
This paper-based test strip has been developed by a research team from the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and Tata Group, led by Debojyoti Chakraborty and Souvik Maiti.
The CSIR Research team was previously working under sickle cell mission for genome diagnostics and therapeutics, during which they realised that the same technology can be utilised to create a new testing kit for COVID-19.
What are the benefits of the #FeludaCOVID19Test over other tests?

The Feluda test can be conducted by taking a sample of saliva or blood. Its working is similar to that of a pregnancy test. The paper strip will change its colour and generate two lines for positive diagnosis.
The time taken for the diagnosis will be less than 30 minutes. According to reports, the cost of the test will be around Rs. 500, which will make it much more affordable than the tests that are being used currently.
In comparison, the RT-PCR tests, which are priced between Rs 1,600 to Rs 2,000, tend to be expensive for the general population. Meanwhile, antibody tests cost Rs 500-600 and give out results within 30 minutes.

#covid19
A rapid antigen test kit costs Rs 450, and also gives out results within 30 minutes, whereas the TruNat tests detect the virus within 60 minutes and cost around Rs 1,300.

#coronavirus
The accuracy level of the Feluda test is equivalent to that of the RT-PCR test, which is considered to be of the topmost standard.

#coronavirus #covid19test #feluda

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with The Weather Channel India

The Weather Channel India Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @weatherindia

Aug 17, 2022
While searching for life in the Gulf of Mexico, researchers pulled out a new bizarre-looking species of isopod, whose head resembles the Darth Vader from Star Wars!

Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/bi…

By: @anujav_97

📸: Dr Ming-Chih H/Journal of Natural History

🧵👇
This new-found crustacean, named Bathonymus yucatanensis, has 14 legs and is around 26 cm long — approximately 25 times larger than its closest relative, the common woodlouse.
While these blonde creatures seem pretty scary, the "Vanilla Vaders" are, in fact, harmless to humans.

Their huge size is only due to deep-sea gigantism — a phenomenon wherein ocean dwellers grow bigger than their terrestrial relatives due to lack of sunlight.

📸: SJADES 2018
Read 7 tweets
Aug 16, 2022
The Sun spewed out two consecutive coronal mass ejections on August 14-15, giving rise to a 'Cannibal CME'.

The scarier part? It's heading towards the Earth this week & could spark strong geomagnetic storms on Aug 18!

Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/sp…

By: @ashmitagupta_21

🧵👇
A cloud of dark plasma erupted on the solar surface on Aug 14, launching a #CME that could side sweep the Earth's magnetic field.

Then, on Aug 15, an exploding magnetic filament launched another CME right at its tail.
This could be a Cannibal CME event where the second CME might overtake and gobble up the first, creating a mish-mash of the two.

Cannibal CMEs contain tangled magnetic fields and compressed plasmas that can spark strong geomagnetic storms.

📽️: Animation by Walt Feimer/NASA
Read 7 tweets
Aug 6, 2022
Japan's #Subaru Strategic Program has discovered a super-Earth four times the mass of our planet orbiting a red dwarf just 37 lightyears away.

The good news? This #exoplanet, named Ross 508b, might be habitable!

Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/sp…

By: @ashmitagupta_21

🧵👇 Image
This super-Earth is a rocky world, on which a year is equal to just 11 Earth days.

The short orbit is down to the red dwarfs being a lot smaller than the Sun that centres our solar system. But the smaller sizes also make their gravitational fields less expansive than the Sun's. Image
Therefore, Ross 508b revolves around its red dwarf at a distance of just 5 million km. Mercury, in comparison, is about 60 million km from the Sun.

The short distance between this super-Earth & its red dwarf begs the question: how could it possibly be habitable? Image
Read 7 tweets
Jul 15, 2022
#Japan is making grand plans of creating interplanetary #trains and champagne flute-like glass habitats in its bid to send and host humans on the #Moon and #Mars!

Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/sp…

📸: Youtube SC/Kajima Corp.

Thread. 👇
An interplanetary transportation system dubbed the 'Hexatrack', which maintains a gravity of 1G during long-distance travel to mitigate the effects of prolonged exposure to low gravity, has been proposed by #Japanese researchers.
The #trains will also possess 'Hexacapsules', which are essentially hexagon-shaped capsules with a moving device in the middle.
Read 7 tweets
Jul 14, 2022
A new species of #dinosaur has just dropped and word on the street is that it’s pretty similar to the #TRex

In fact, researchers think this discovery could explain why these beasts evolved to have tiny arms!

Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/sc…

📸: Jorge A Gonzalez

Thread. 👇 Image
In 2012, the almost-complete skeleton of a new kind of #dinosaur was found in the northern Patagonia region of #Argentina.

The dinosaur has been christened #Meraxes gigas. The generic epithet is an ode to a dragon in the #GameOfThrones series.
Standing at the height of 11 m (36 ft) and weighing roughly 4000 kgs, the #dinosaur sported several crests, bumps and horns on its skull, which lent it a menacing appearance.

But the highlight of the findings is that the dinosaur had teeny-tiny arms, just like the #Trex! Image
Read 6 tweets
Jul 14, 2022
#NASA-led #JamesWebbSpaceTelescope's breathtaking images of the universe's past have taken the world by storm.

As we inch closer to unravelling more cosmic secrets, here's how researchers from #India plan to use the #JWST.

Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/sp…

Thread👇
#NASA had opened up submissions for Guaranteed Time Observations to reward scientists with 16% use of the JWST observatory for the first 3 cycles.

Out of the 1,173 proposals, two astronomers hail from India: Dr #JessyJose from @IiserTirupati & Dr #Puravankara from @TIFRScience.
Dr Jose, along with an international research team from the US, UK and Australia, will be examining the Galactic Centre Cloud (GCC) — the central molecular zone of our Milky Way — in April 2023.

They have been allotted 27.3 hours over the access period of 12 months.
Read 8 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(