A More Reliable and Less Traumatic Swab for COVID-19 Testing

January 1, 2021

City of Hope Engineering, 2020–21

Liaison(s): Dr. Yuman Fong, Dr. Thomas J Gernon, Dr. Stanley Hamilton, Colin Cook
Advisor(s): Kash Gokli
Students(s): Marylin Roque (TL-S), Sophie Yu (TL-F), Natalie Krieger, Kevin Proudfoot, Vivian Lam (S), Kaitlyn Paulsen (S), Vadim Mathys (F)

The goal of this project is to develop a more reliable and less traumatic form of COVID-19 testing. After an extensive review of available testing methods, the team chose to improve upon the current most effective form of testing, nasopharyngeal swabbing, by focusing on reliability (lowering false negative rate), comfortability, and manufacturability. At the completion of this project, the team hopes to patent a swab that improves testing for COVID-19 and other pathogens.