A handout photo. The BioTeke Covid-19 testing robot is displayed at this year’s World Robot Conference in Beijing.A Chinese company says it has developed a robot that can perform Covid-19 testing with unprecedented speed and efficiency.
There are other Covid-19 test robots on the market, but most of them focus on the sampling process, with robots standing in for on-site staff to collect oral swab samples. The samples are then sent to a laboratory for analysis, and it usually takes more than 12 hours for users to get their results. The sampling module was developed by BioTeke in cooperation with a research centre at Tsinghua University’s Institute for Artificial Intelligence“Researchers built models of human mouths and developed an image recognition algorithm for a high-accuracy mechanical arm. The arm is able to move autonomously and gently collect oral swab samples from a user’s throat,” Meng saidAfter collection, the nucleic acid in the sample requires purification and amplification to yield a result.
“We have licences for some of the modules inside, and the robot is undergoing verification by the National Medical Products Administration,” Meng said.