Viral Detection: Past, Present, and Future

Abstract

Viruses are essentially composed of a nucleic acid (segmented or not, DNA, or RNA) and a protein coat. Despite their simplicity, these small pathogens are responsible for significant economic and humanitarian losses that have had dramatic consequences in the course of human history. Since their discovery, scientists have developed different strategies to efficiently detect viruses, using all possible viral features. Viruses shape, proteins, and nucleic acid are used in viral detection. In this review, the development of these techniques, especially for plant and mammalian viruses, their strengths and weaknesses as well as the latest cutting‐edge technologies that may be playing important roles in the years to come are described.

Lateral flow assays (LFA) as an alternative medical diagnosis method for detection of virus species: The intertwine of nanotechnology with sensing strategies

“…Serological methods are clinical procedures characterized by detecting immunoglobulins in various samples and consist of multiple tests like immunohistochemistry (IHC), agglutination test, flow cytometry, radioimmunoassay, and ELISA [ 19 , 20 ]. Despite being one of the oldest detection techniques, serological methods are still widely used in clinical recognitions owning to their high sensitivity, specificity, ease of use and cheapness.…”

“…In addition, the RT-PCR procedure is very time-consuming, which makes it unsuitable for quick detection in clinical detection. LAMPs have retractions in their primer design and are susceptible to contamination [ 20 , 35 , 36 ]. Due to such limitations in the current approaches, a rapid, specific, sensitive, user-friendly, and affordable diagnostic method for virus detection is required.…”

Nanobiosensor‐based diagnostic tools in viral infections: Special emphasis on Covid‐19

“…The first biosensor was created in 1956 although the biosensors concept came in 1903. 37 Biosensors are devices that involve in transforming biological responses into electrical signals. The purpose of a biosensor is to detect or sense a specific biological material which may be proteins, antibodies, immunological molecules, enzymes ans so forth.…”

Global Advances in Tomato Virome Research: Current Status and the Impact of High-Throughput Sequencing

“…Until a decade ago, viruses were mostly analyzed using targeted detection techniques such as ELISA, PCR, and Sanger sequencing (Katsarou et al, 2019). These methods are widely available in molecular biology labs, but they require a priori information on viral genomes or serological properties of viral species that might be present in a sample.…”