Kirby Institute team creates Covid-19 variant identifier

New South Wales researchers say their tool is fast, cheap and scalable

Australian researchers have revealed a method for isolating variants of the Covid-19 virus that they say is unprecedentedly fast and accurate.

The technique uses cells with virus-friendly receptors that are quickly affected by Covid-19, allowing the researchers to pinpoint what variant is present, as well as how sick it is likely to make patients. It was developed using samples from hotel quarantine patients over the course of 2021 the team behind it reports in a paper in the journal Nature Microbiology on 31 May.