The software, called Taxonomer, can analyze the sequences of all nucleic acids in a clinical specimen of either DNA or RNA and profile a patient’s gene expression to detect pathogens in a matter of minutes. The scientists published their study of the software in the journal Genome Biology.
This type of technology could prove to be as important to the infectious disease industry as sequencing the human genome, according to one of the authors of the study, Mark Yandell, PhD, professor of human genetics at the University of Utah.
Robert Schlaberg, MD, medical director at ARUP Laboratories and cofounder of IDbyDNA, said benchmark analyses showed Taxonomer was 10 to 100 times faster than similar tools that take awhile because they rely on growing cultures of suspected pathogens in the laboratory.
“Taxonomer provides a critical step forward, as it is extremely fast, accurate and easy enough to use for implementation in diagnostic laboratories,” said Dr. Schlaberg.
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