Coronavirus Technology To Save Salmon?

Technology used to fight diseases such as the novel coronavirus could be used in diagnostic kits targeting seven different salmon diseases.

That\’s the message from Gdansk based Fish Farm Solutions LLC. The Polish outfit is developing a tool which it believes can win the battle against pancreatic disease and seven other common diseases found on salmon and trout farms, by speeding up the diagnostic process.

Under the current systems, farmers can wait for up to two weeks to get back laboratory results from tests, meaning that it is often then too late to prevent the spread of the disease. Fish Farm Solutions believes that it can slash that waiting time to just 5-10 minutes. It\’s solution, called FishSensor, uses electrochemical spectroscopy impedance, used to construct electrodes coated with biological molecules that identify certain pathogens. It is already used on humans to find viruses such as the flu and Covid-19.

The company has an exclusive licencing deal for the technology, developed using public money made available by the Polish government for research & development projects, as well as an injection of private capital. Although it has not yet secured any commercial customers, the technology is developing \’rapidly\’, even allowing for the fact that progress has recently been stunted by the strict social distancing rules in place in Poland.

Definitely one to watch.