Hong Kong DNA Chips Limited 香港基因晶片開發有限公司
	Serving the World with Biotechnology

Human Diagnostic Testing for Avian Influenza Available
at Hong Kong DNA Chips Limited

Hong Kong DNA Chips Limited (HKDNA), a leading biotechnology company in Asia, is proud to announce its new test system on human avian influenza virus (AIV). The test system has been evaluated using various strains of AIV from humans and birds including the most recent isolates from the Asian outbreaks.

Since its establishment in 1999, the company has been performing extensive research on AIV, with publications in major peer-reviewed journals. It has also developed and been granted patents in their virus detection systems for pathogens such as AIV, foot-and-mouth disease, classical swine fever, and SARS-CoV, all of which are modern infectious veterinary diseases, some being transmissible to humans. Worth noting now is the potential application of AIV testing in different countries not only in monitoring the health of poultries, but also in public healthcare systems for testing human samples with influenza.

Currently, three molecular diagnostic technologies developed by HKDNA are available for human AIV detection, namely VDS, VetDetect, and VetScreen. VDS makes use of the highly advanced nucleic acid sequence-based amplification (NASBA) technology, VetDetect utilizes real-time reverse transcriptase - polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), whereas VetScreen employs the conventional gel-based RT-PCR technique. All these tests are highly sensitive and specific which gives accurate results in a short period of time. VDS and VetDetect, for instance, could have results available in 2-4 hours.

Dr. Terence L.T. Lau, Chief Operating Officer and General Manager of HKDNA, said, "It usually takes up to a week for traditional immuno-based detection methods to give results, and they are not sensitive enough. On the contrary, our kits serve as an excellent tool for rapid and accurate diagnosis of AIV infection, and they offer a wide spectrum of choices fulfilling the needs of different laboratories." There are two types of testing kits available for VDS, one using electrochemiluminescence (ECL) which requires an ECL detector, and one utilizes our novel enzyme-linked oligonucleotide capture (EOC) technology which only requires the standard ELISA plate reader. NASBA-EOC, being equally sensitive and specific to NASBA-ECL, makes this invaluable tool affordable to many laboratories around the world.

For laboratories that prefer to use RT-PCR, both real-time and gel-based options are available through VetDetect and VetScreen.

In fact, HKDNA AIV test systems are either already in use or being evaluated by various government and private laboratories worldwide in the testing of influenza samples, including agricultural departments and inspection and quarantine bureaus in China, Thailand and South Africa, and animal health organization reference laboratories around the globe. "The kits are constantly modified so that they are able to cover the most recent isolates resulting from mutations. Whether to private or government laboratories, they offer extremely cost-effective means for AIV detection," Dr. Lau added.

Recent researches have reported that the 1918 Spanish influenza epidemic, which swept through the globe costing 50 million humans lives, was caused by the transmission of AIV from poultry to humans. Trends have also shown that human and avian influenza epidemics reappeared nearly every 30 years in the past. With the last occurrence in 1968, we are in a very susceptible time period for possibly another pandemic. Devastations could however be minimized if we could make proper use of the advanced genetic diagnostic technologies available on AIV detection.

Professor Albert Yu, Chairman and CEO of HKDNA, said, "Our company has been the first and so far the only private laboratory around the world to commit in the research and development of such a diagnostic tool for AI. We have always aimed at providing accurate, rapid, and sensitive tests that could be relied on when crisis like this occur. The uniqueness of our kits and the fact that they are backed by scientific evidence provide a huge advantage over other commercial detection technologies. Through application of advanced biotechnology diagnostic tools, we hope that mass slaughtering of poultry would no longer be seen and more importantly, loss of valuable human lives could be minimized through early detection so that corresponding actions could be taken as quickly as possible."

The scope of our activities ranges from:

• Research and development of our Lab-on-a-Chip system - the latest revolution in rapid clinical and non-clinical diagnosis and novel genetic markers
• To the provision of new veterinary and clinical diagnostic methods for infectious diseases and DNA testing services, such as: parentage, pre-natal screening, DNA fingerprinting and genetically modified food testing
  

For further information about any of our products and services please contact:

Dr. Terence Lau
Hong Kong DNA Chips Limited
8/F, Hang Tung Resources Centre, 18 A-Kung Ngam Village Road, Shau Kei Wan, Hong Kong SAR, China
Tel: +(852) 2111 2123
Fax: +(852) 2111 9762
Email: info@hkdnachips.com
http://www.hkdnachips.com

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