Research Projects

Tuberculosis (TB) is major global health burden causing 1.5 million deaths annually. Affordable and sensitive detection of TB is urgently required to catch 3x106 TB patients who are left undiagnosed. Definitive diagnostics of pulmonary TB is performed by confirming the presence of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) in sputum samples. Currently smear microscopy is the main diagnostic method used in India, which lacks desired sensitivity. The project aims to develop a field deployable, automated, affordable and rapid MTB diagnostics test-system called “iMC2 TB test”. This involves thinning of the sputum sample in a single use capture bottle preloaded with reagents and followed by immuno-magnetic enrichment of the MTB cells using an automated, portable device. Enriched MTB cells will be confirmed using an inbuilt fluorescent detector. Assay kit will be pre-packaged, designed to drastically minimize exposure of aerosol to clinical workers, would cost around 300-500 INR and will take about 60 minutes per sample.