Development and Evaluation of A CRISPR-based Diagnostic For 2019-novel Coronavirus

Tieying Hou; Weiqi Zeng; Minling Yang; Wenjing Chen; Lili Ren; Jingwen Ai; Ji Wu; Yalong Liao; Xuejing Gou; Yongjun Li; Xiaorui Wang; Hang Su; Jianwei Wang; Bing Gu; Teng Xu

Since the beginning of 2020, a surging number of pneumonia caused by infections of a novel 56 coronavirus (2019-nCoV) have been identified in China, especially Wuhan, a metropolitan 57 city with a population of over 10 million. [1, 2] In recent days, the outbreak has affected 58 multiple countries and caused worldwide impact. The epidemic of 2019-nCoV was first discovered by metagenomic next-generation 69 sequencing (mNGS) in which the novel virus was found to be a new pathogenic member of 70 the betacoronavirus genus but shared only about 79% in genetic similarity with SARS. [8, 9] 71 Currently, metagenomics and RT-PCR are two molecular approaches most commonly used 72 diagnostics for this novel virus. [13, 14] However, the diagnostic performance of different 73 molecular methods have not been investigated. 74 All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. the author/funder, who has granted medRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity.