COVIRAP: IIT Kharagpur's COVID-19 test kit all set for mass production

An international patent for Covirap has been received by two faculty members of IIT Kharagpur, Suman Chakraborty and Arindam Mondal. 

IIT-Kharagpur has come up with a testing kit for the novel coronavirus. According to the reports, the testing kit is complete with a machine that will bring down the cost of each diagnosis to anything between Rs 100 and Rs 150. The kit takes almost 45 minutes flat to give results. By the end of the month, Covirap, as the kit has been christened, is going in for mass production. An international patent for Covirap has been received by two faculty members, Suman Chakraborty and Arindam Mondal. They are in the process of going in for technology transfer and are tying up with a global pharmaceutical company that will help in mass production. The institute will announce the name of the company soon.

"Covirap, like the RT-PCR, is a nucleic acid-based test but is done in a rapid format, without the use of a hi-tech lab but with the help of a highly efficient machine," the institute said. Faculty members said that they had been able to bring over 95% accuracy. Since the use of the lab and other paraphernalia have been reduced, the test can be done at a nominal cost and can be used for community testing.

Meanwhile, the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur commenced the admission application process for the joint MTech, MCP PhD Programme. Candidates interested in IIT Kharagpur Admissions 2021 must note that the entire admission process will be conducted online. The last date to apply for the course is April 20. Applications will be considered valid online after the submission of the application fee of Rs 500.

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