Rutgers’ RUCDR Infinite Biologics has launched a test for the coronavirus and is using its automation experience and infrastructure to test as many as tens of thousands of samples daily, the biorepository announced.

In a statement, RUCDR said it also has submitted an emergency use authorization request for a saliva collection method that will allow for broader population screening.

The effort significantly increases testing capacity in New Jersey and will provide information that allows people who test positive to self-quarantine, thereby limiting the spread of the virus, RUCDR said. As a result, health care providers, first responders and others will be able to quickly and safely return to work after recovering from COVID-19 and testing negative, it said.

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"The test can help hospital-based and private physicians to accurately assess the infection status of more patients, with RUCDR Infinite Biologics doing the analysis,” said Dr. Jay A. Tischfield, founding CEO and scientific director of RUCDR Infinite Biologics and a professor in the Department of Genetics at Rutgers–New Brunswick and at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.

Based on a Nobel Prize-winning laboratory technique that makes millions of copies of the SARS-CoV-2 virus nucleic acid, the test is available to the RWJBarnabas Health network, whose partnership with the university includes Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital and University Hospital in Newark. Several county health departments also have the test, RUCDR said.

Testing a nasal or throat swab sample determines whether someone is infected, with results available to providers within three days, RUCDR said. Saliva testing would be a new development and would allow testing without the need of a medical provider to take the sample, it said.

The rapid deployment of the test throughout the state is part of a long-standing partnership between RUCDR and Accurate Diagnostic Labs, RUCDR said. ADL provides reference lab services for RUCDR, which facilitates clinical trials that RUCDR supports. They fast-tracked the validation and verification of new testing methodologies, including saliva, for COVID-19, which will catapult access of testing and screening to the most needed population, it added.

“We can accept hundreds to thousands of samples for analysis per day now and potentially will be able to test tens of thousands of samples daily in the next several weeks,” said Dr. Andrew I. Brooks, RUCDR's chief operating officer and director of technology development at RUCDR Infinite Biologics who also is a Rutgers genetics professor.

“Saliva testing will help with the global shortage of swabs for sampling and increase testing of patients, and it will not require health care professionals to collect samples,” Brooks continued. “Saliva testing will also be important for people who are in quarantine because they don’t know how long it will be until they are no longer infectious. This will allow health care and workers to release themselves from quarantine and safely come back to work.”

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RUCDR Infinite Biologics, which is part of Rutgers’ Human Genetics Institute of New Jersey, is the world’s largest university-based cell and DNA repository. Its mission is to understand the genetic causes of common, complex diseases and to discover diagnoses, treatments and cures for them. The organization collaborates with researchers in the public and private sectors throughout the world, providing bio-banking services, biomaterials and scientific and technical support.

RUCDR's "high throughput" reference lab testing coincides with point-of-care testing being done by Rutgers' Dr. David Alland in collaboration with with Cepheid, a California-based molecular diagnostics company. Alland is the director of the Rutgers' new COVID-19 hub launched to help battle the virus.

"Point of care means that the test is done at the site where the patient is and results are returned to the patient at that visit," Tischfield explained "High throughput means potentially 10,000 tests per day done at one site. These tests would be submitted by hospitals, health departments and doctors, and the results would be reported back to the patients once they are returned to the medical practitioner, hospital or health department."

Email: bmakin@gannettnj.com

Bob Makin covers Rutgers for MyCentralJersey.com and the USA TODAY NETWORK New Jersey. To get unlimited access to his informative and entertaining work, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.