Researchers are developing detection methods for Ebola

Scientists from Jena are working on a new detection method for Ebola and other viruses

08/08/2014

The Ebola epidemic in West Africa has already claimed hundreds of casualties and highlighted significant disease control deficiencies. The inadequate diagnostic options also played a role here. Researchers at the Institute of Physical Chemistry and the Leibniz Institute for Photonic Technologies Jena are currently working on a new detection method at the University of Jena that could reliably provide a diagnosis within a few hours, according to the announcement of the „Thuringian general“.

With the help of the new method dangerous pathogens such as the Ebola virus can be detected within hours, reports the newspaper. The scientists of the University of Jena used in their experiments the procedure of the so-called biophotonic analysis, with the help of which in earlier studies already bacteria could be clearly identified. The researchers have adapted the method to virus detection by using a „developed a special atomic force microscope that scans even the smallest structures of the virus surface“, she writes „Thuringian General“. The microscope was „comparable to the needle of a record player“, explained the head of the Institute of Physical Chemistry at the University of Jena, Professor Jürgen Popp to the newspaper. „In this way we get an optical fingerprint of the virus“, Popp continues.

Special microscope detects the surface of the viruses
Currently, if Ebola is suspected, only blood tests in the lab can provide clear information, causing some delays. For prophylactic examination method is also too expensive, so that in the absence of Ebola symptoms usually no blood test is performed. A faster, simpler diagnostic method is therefore urgently needed. In the future this could be the new procedure of the Jena researchers, which has just completed a successful series of experiments with the detection of 15 different viruses. However, the Ebola virus was not among them, but for security reasons, no disease-transmitting or inactivated viruses were chosen, according to the announcement of the „Thuringian general“. Also currently being worked on to reduce the device system to manageable and portable size. In the course of the current Ebola epidemic, the new verification process is unlikely to be used due to these pending technical adjustments.

New diagnostic device only ready for use in five years
According to Professor Volker Deckert, a staff member at the Institute of Physical Chemistry at the University of Jena, until such a new diagnostic device can be used in practice, for example, to control travelers with Ebola suspicion at airports and reliably identify the virus to carry out development work for at least five more years with appropriate tests and examinations. (Fp)