Release date: 2015-10-29
The legendary startup company Theranos in the biotechnology industry has recently been drowned by public opinion. Since the Wall Street Journal published the report, the US technology and media circles have been crazy. Happy.
Among them, Bill Maris, the founder of Google Ventures. This buddy sullenly told Business insider that in fact, as early as 2013, Google Ventures had the idea of ​​investing in Theranos. Later, the company's experts went to Walgreens (the experience store in Theranos was there) to experience it for himself. As a result, the expert came back and said, "Theranos want more than one drop of blood. They have to take venous blood. I won't smoke it!" So, Google Ventures didn't vote. When the words came out, the girl of Theranos, Sherlock Holmes, replied, "We've never met them. In fact, they reached out to us and we said no to meeting with them." After reading this, the singular cake I really can't help but laugh, this girl is so calm! !
When Gossip said it, the main thing to say is that the US scientific and media circles have questioned the whole week and basically stayed on the trivial matter. Can the Theranos technology black box be opened? Is there any spectrum in this technology? Ever since, the author has dug up the "diagnostic technology for blood dripping" (the name I made). Who knows, this does not dig, I don’t know, I’m scared.
The company that masters this "black technology" can be more than the Theranos family (Is the Theranos really mastered it?)! Below I will give you a brief introduction to the three. I hope that I can play the "one leaf knows the autumn" effect. If there is a day when Theranos really announced his "black technology", you don't even understand it!
Start with the old company Abbott (Abbott). Abbott's iSTAT device is such a "drip blood diagnostic" device, which only needs 65-100μL of whole blood (two drops of venous blood, not blood) or urine, you can see the results in 2 minutes. In 2011, iSTAT received FDA approval and is now available.
i-STAT test cartridges
i-STAT test cartridges are blood-loading devices. The whole column consisting of the uppermost black blocks is the detection chip. The number of chips determines the number of detection parameters; the small hole formed by the lower blue in the whole device is the place where the blood is injected. Below each i-STAT test cartridges are their codenames indicating which tests it does.
i-STAT test cartridges Menu
According to Abbott's official website, the iSTAT device can only detect 26 indicators. The above picture shows the items that can be detected by each i-STAT test cartridges, such as EC8+ detection of 13 indicators, and so on. Obviously, some i-STAT test cartridges have many items to detect, some have fewer items, and only one item is tested for i-STAT test cartridges, which should be related to the nature of the test substance. The video below is how the i-STAT system works.
Next, talk about the DMI (Dna Med Institute) company. This company is incredible, and their equipment is used to participate in the "three-recorder" competition. The name of this device is rHEALTH. rHEALTH has been developing for seven years under the auspices of NASA, NIH and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Last year rHEALTH also won the Nokia Sensor X Challenge Award. DMI has developed three types of testing equipment, one for scientific research and the other two for household equipment that can be carried around.
rHEALTH X1
The rHEALTH X1 shown above is for household use. Only need 5-10μL of finger blood (very small drop, about the size of sesame seeds), note that DMI is also doing finger blood test, and rHEALTH can make hundreds of diseases in just a few minutes. diagnosis. However, rHEALTH currently does not meet FDA-approved clinical standards. Therefore, rHEALTH is still a certain distance from the clinic.
As the CEO, founder and chief scientist of DMI, microfluidic expert Eugene Chan also has concerns about finger blood testing. Since the droplets are too small, there is a large tension and viscosity, so trace amounts of blood are difficult to handle. “The Reynolds number of trace blood is very low, directly causing it to be as sticky as a pudding. As a result, there is a huge challenge: how to mix it with the test substance on a microscopic scale?†Eugene Chan accepts the company Line magazine said in an interview, "When it contains larger substances such as blood cells, mixing is more difficult."
DMI seems to have overcome this problem. They mix nanostrips and reaction solutions in a small amount of blood, and then use lasers to illuminate the samples. The changes in the laser spectrum can be used to analyze changes in blood substances. At present, DMI's official website has not been announced, what are the more than 100 kinds of substances they can detect.
The last one to appear was Genalyte's Maverick. Founded in 2007, Genalyte received a $11.8 million Series B financing in 2012, a CE certification in 2013, and a $44 million Series C financing from Khosla Ventures on September 18, 2015. The Maverick test also requires only one drop of finger blood, and can detect more than 30 indicators at a time in 15 minutes. Currently, 128 indicators can be detected. It seems that Maverick will be a strong opponent of Edison. This is all right! ! Take a look at Genalyte's web design below, a bit like calling it with Theranos.
In fact, Genalyte's test sample also refers to blood. Genalyte's CEO Cary Gunn believes that "finger blood test can't give you an accurate result." This means: blood test can only tell you if there is no way, but no way Tell you exactly how much. Genalyte's Maverick detection system uses the principle of antigen-antibody binding to detect the presence of disease-associated proteins in the blood.
In summary, Abbott's chemical detection methods, DMI's physical and chemical methods, and Genalyte's biological methods have largely covered most of the possibilities in the field of "drip blood diagnostics". Understand the three "black technologies" above, and when the "generous" of Theranos is shown to us, you will not be surprised by the chin.
According to reports, Theranos's partner Walgreens has also begun to question Theranos' detection technology. Walgreens has suspended the expansion of Theranos' business, waiting until Theranos' detection technology is under supervision.
Theranos has to catch up, everyone is waiting for the truth.
Source: Singularity Network
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