Gaining a better understanding of infectious diseases, including their characterization, evolution, and transmission, continues to be a priority, both from an R&D standpoint and as a public health issue. The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the need for a wide range of tools to research infectious diseases, develop diagnostics and vaccines, and conduct epidemiological and surveillance studies. Development of molecular diagnostics that robustly and accurately detect harmful micro-organisms, including viruses, are critical to identifying and preventing the spread of disease. Nucleic acid amplification is commonly used to identify the presence of specific sequences within pathogenic microbes. These techniques include qPCR and RT-qPCR for real time quantitation of nucleic acids and loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) for robust, single temperature amplification, which can be performed easily in the point-of-care setting, such as a clinic or in the field. Sequencing has also proven a useful tool in the detection of variants, aiding in the real-time monitoring of changing viral dynamics in an at-risk population. Epidemiological studies are important as they help to better characterize disease-causing agents, including viruses, as well as monitor evolution and spread of disease. NGS can be used to identify variants, which can then help track disease transmission, and inform public health decisions as well as drug and diagnostic development.
Recent experience has exposed the need for high quality reagents that are accessible at scale, often under more stringent conditions, and that are available in a variety of product formats. Many products from New England Biolabs have played a role in the global response to SARS-CoV-2, from supporting the development of COVID-19 diagnostics and vaccines to improving the speed and accuracy of Illumina® and Nanopore-based COVID-19 sample analysis. These products can also be utilized with other infectious diseases, such as influenza and malaria, in multiplex assays for simultaneous detection and differentiation.