Software Assembles Complete Genome Sequences On-Demand

 Software Assembles Complete Genome Sequences On-Demand

National Human Genome Research Institute

Anna Rogers, February 16, 2023

The Verkko software created by U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) researchers can construct complete genome sequences from diverse species. Sergey Koren at NIH's National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) said Verkko automates the process used in last year's assembly of the first gapless human genome sequence by the Telomere-to-Telomere consortium. The consortium took years to manually assemble the remaining 8% to 10% of the sequence, which Verkko can accomplish in days. The software pieces together small fragments to produce partial components, then compares the constructed regions with larger fragments; the latter become a scaffold for arranging the more detailed regions into a complete sequence. NHGRI's Adam Phillippy said, "Verkko can democratize generating gapless genome sequences," and "will make assembling complete genome sequences as affordable and routine as possible."

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GE Working on Detecting COVID with a Smartphone

More detail, here from GE on their work on detecting COVID with a smartphone.

GE Scientists Developing Technology to Add COVID-19 Virus Detector to Your Mobile Device

Sensing Materials

Awarded National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant to develop tiny sensors smaller than your fingertip that can detect the presence of COVID-19 virus nano-particles on screens, tables and other surfaces

Multi-disciplinary team from GE Research will draw from years of development and commercial success with physical, environmental, gas and biosensors for industrial  monitoring

The Team’s work has been featured in journals Nature Electronics 2020 and Lab on a Chip 2021

NISKAYUNA, New York, April 8, 2021 – Building on a suite of successful sensing technologies that have resulted in field demonstrations and a commercial launch for industrial monitoring, GE Research has been awarded a 24-month NIH grant (U01AA029324) of the RADx-rad program to develop miniature sensors that can detect the presence of the COVID-19 virus nano-particles on an array of different surfaces.

“One of the first lines of defense against any virus is avoiding exposure, which is easier said than done when you can’t see it,” said Radislav Potyrailo, a principal scientist at GE Research and principal investigator on the NIH project. “Through our project with the NIH, we are developing a sensor small enough to embed in a mobile device that could detect the presence of the COVID-19 virus.”

Potyrailo added, “We all come into contact with different surfaces during any given day, from computer screens and conference tables to kiosks at the airport and of course, credit card machines at stores while running errands.  While everyone does a great job keeping these surfaces clean, we want to add an extra layer of safety by being able to detect the presence of the virus.”  ... '

GE Working on COVID Detection with SmartPhones

Quite interesting idea, accuracy and other details unclear. On surfaces too?   Could be very useful in the current and upcoming pandemics. 

GE is working to put COVID-19 virus-detecting sensors in phones   in Engadget.

The system can identify coronavirus particles on surfaces.

Our phones have been integral in the fight against COVID-19 through test and trace systems that helped to contain the virus in places like South Korea and Taiwan. Now, scientists are harnessing smartphones again to identify coronavirus particles on surfaces as an additional line of defense against the pandemic, alongside more robust treatments such as vaccines and antiviral drugs. Researchers at General Electric have been awarded a National Institutes of Health grant to develop tiny sensors that can be embedded in mobiles to detect the presence of COVID-19 nano-particle ... '

NIH Partners with Google Cloud

Note that integration of Machine Learning is specifically mentioned.  Once you have the right data readily accessible,  many kinds of analytics can be tested and applied.

NIH Partners With Google Cloud to Speed Up Medical Breakthroughs 
NextGov.com

By Jack Corrigan in NextGov

A new U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) program aims to help NIH researchers accelerate biomedical advances providing access to more commercial cloud computing technologies. NIH's Science and Technology Research Infrastructure for Discovery, Experimentation, and Sustainability Initiative (STRIDES) will give scientists access to analytics tools to speed up biomedical data-crunching. STRIDES' initial concentration will be on making "high-value" datasets accessible via the cloud and adopting data-centric machine learning and artificial intelligence applications. Google Cloud was chosen as NIH's first STRIDES partner so it can offer its cloud storage, computing, and machine learning tools to NIH teams and about 2,500 federally-funded institutions. Google Cloud also will collaborate with the NIH Data Commons program to devise cloud-based biomedical data-sharing solutions.  ... "