A Singapore medical diagnostics company has announced on Monday that a chip it produced has tested successfully on confirmed pandemic H1N1-2009 influenza positive samples.

VereFlu influenza chip is developed by Veredus Laboratories, a local medical diagnostics company in conjunction with ST Microelectronics, a global leader in silicon chip design and manufacturing, according to a statement issued by Veredus Laboratories on Monday.

The VereFlu chip is a portable lab-on-chip application that canidentify and differentiate human strains of Influenza A and B viruses in a single test with high accuracy and sensitivity.

It is a portable lab-on-chip application for rapid detection of all major influenza types at the point of need in a single test. Unlike existing diagnostic methods, VereFlu can detect infection with high accuracy and sensitivity within two hours, providing genetic information of the infection that traditionally would take days to weeks to learn.

The chip has been tested successfully in a joint trial with the Singapore Health Ministry's National Public Health Laboratory (NPHL).

The ability of the chip to simultaneously lock on multiple segments of the genes of the H1N1 influenza virus enables it to identify the virus with a much higher degree of confidence compared to other tests.

Rosemary Tan, Chief Executive Officer of Veredus Laboratories, said that its next step is to enable the chip to check for drug resistance in Influenza A (H1N1) as it mutates. This will significantly enhance its capability to combat potentially deadly variants of influenza viruses.

Vere Flu is already being deployed to several pilot users in Asia and Middle East.

Singapore reported its first confirmed case of Influenza A/H1N1on May 27, and the country has a total number of such cases to 1055 so far.

Source: Xinhua