The peptide-based diagnostic tool was developed by scientists from the Agharkar Research Institute (ARI), an autonomous institute of India’s Department of Science and Technology (DST). According to a press release from India’s Press Information Bureau, it was granted a patent on March 31, 2022 as an alternative biorecognition item.

WSSV infections in vannamei shrimp cause huge losses of shrimp worldwide every year. Early and rapid pathogen detection technologies in the field should help prevent losses.

ARI scientists Dr. Prabir Kulabhusan, Dr. Jyutika Rajwade and Dr. Kishore Paknikar developed the lateral flow test using gold nanoparticles for easy visualization of results. Instead of using poly-/monoclonal antibodies in assay development, ARI scientists selected twelve amino acid-containing peptides from a phage display library by biopanning.

According to ARI, it is “a time and cost saving approach, eliminating the need to immunize laboratory animals to obtain the antisera. With the use of peptides, the chain requirements cold for storage are reduced and the test becomes user-friendly for production”.

“Our data indicate high specificity (100%) and sensitivity (96.77%) of the test, early detection of hemolymph, highly reproducible results with a time to results of only 20 minutes,” said said Dr. Jyutika Rajwade.

ARI PhD student Ms. Snehal Jamalpure-Lakka now aims to take this work further with a view to commercialization.