GUELPH, Ontario, and Mississauga, Ontario, June 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Next Generation Manufacturing Canada (NGen), the industry-led organization behind Canada’s Advanced Manufacturing Supercluster, has announced funding for Precision Biomonitoring to support the company’s production of test kits to identify COVID-19.
Precision Biomonitoring has received almost $5 million in funding to work directly with Canadian manufacturers to increase production of its TripleLock™ SARS-CoV-2 Go-Strips, a rapid response test that will allow for the early identification of COVID-19.
Rapid, accurate and available testing for COVID-19 is critical to the measures being undertaken by health authorities in Canada as they work to control the spread of the virus and move towards reopening the economy, ensuring the safety of Canadians as they head back into the workplace. Testing capacity has been an ongoing issue as global demand for test kits coupled with limited domestic supply has created shortages.
“Widespread testing is going to be an important part of our vigilance as Canada continues to flatten the curve. I am happy to see the superclusters stepping up in a big way to leverage their membership and Canada’s strong industrial base as part of this effort. The rapid manufacturing of these point-of-care test kits will help ensure that more Canadians can be tested for COVID-19 in a timely manner,” said the Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry.
“Collaboration among Canada’s advanced manufacturing companies has allowed for a rapid response to the COVID-19 pandemic, creating innovative solutions and mobilizing advanced technologies to address the demand for test kits,” said Jayson Myers, CEO at NGen. “The flexibility and adaptability that advanced manufacturing allows has been critically important in addressing the challenges presented by COVID-19, and will continue to be so as governments move to re-open the Canadian economy.”
Leveraging the capabilities of Canadian manufacturers and partners such as Evik Diagnostics, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Shared Value Solutions, McMaster Health Science Centre, Sunnybrook Health Science Centre and the Canadian National Microbiology Lab, Precision Biomonitoring anticipates a production rate capacity of 10,000 units per day or greater.
“Advancing Canadian manufacturing enables us to leverage local capabilities to mitigate manufacturing challenges,” says John Laughlin, CTO at NGen. “We are proud to help drive these collaborative relationships that will position Canada as a world leader in manufacturing point-of-need DNA surveillance and detection tools and ensure that all Canadians, including indigenous peoples, will have adequate access to COVID-19 testing.”
“Developing Canadian manufacturing is not only promising for our response efforts for COVID-19, but also provides a strong foundation as we look to expand into the growing mobile DNA applications market,” says Mario Thomas, CEO, Precision Biomonitoring.
The funding for the project comes from NGen’s commitment to invest $50 million to support companies as they rapidly respond to the COVID-19 pandemic by building a Canadian supply of critically needed technologies, equipment, and medical devices.
About NGen – Next Generation Manufacturing Canada
NGen is the industry-led community behind Canada’s most transformative advanced manufacturing projects. NGen members come from every part of the country and cut across Canada’s manufacturing, technology, advanced research, and start-ups sectors. NGen is an objective facilitator of connections and collaboration among its members, identifying opportunities, building capabilities, and supporting advanced manufacturing decisions. NGen’s industry collaborations bring together talent, opportunity, funding, and business know-how to reduce risk and help business leaders make better choices. NGen is Canada’s Supercluster for Advanced Manufacturing, securing funding from public and private sources, including $230 million in matching dollars from the federal government’s Innovation Superclusters Initiative, to support greater private sector investment in advanced manufacturing projects. NGen seeks to add $13.5 billion dollars and 13,500 new jobs to the economy over the next 10 years by growing world-leading advanced manufacturing capabilities in Canada.
About Precision Biomonitoring
Founded in 2016 by a team of scientists from the University of Guelph’s Biodiversity Institute of Ontario, Precision Biomonitoring provides TripleLock™ onsite eDNA surveillance platform solutions that give customers earlier detection of organisms for a more rapid response. Customers are any organizations that need onsite surveillance and rapid identification of any organism in any environment. The Precision Biomonitoring team is at the forefront of technological innovations in the genomics industry. Our vision is a world where we can identify any organism on the spot, in an instant, anywhere on the planet.
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The body of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei — who died after being set on fire by her partner in Kenya — was received Friday by family and anti-femicide crusaders, ahead of her burial a day later.
Cheptegei’s family met with dozens of activists Friday who had marched to the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital’s morgue in the western city of Eldoret while chanting anti-femicide slogans.
She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed by her partner in Kenya in yet another case of gender-based violence in recent years.
Viola Cheptoo, the founder of Tirop Angels – an organization that was formed in honor of athlete Agnes Tirop, who was stabbed to death in 2021, said stakeholders need to ensure this is the last death of an athlete due to gender-based violence.
“We are here to say that enough is enough, we are tired of burying our sisters due to GBV,” she said.
It was a somber mood at the morgue as athletes and family members viewed Cheptegei’s body which sustained 80% of burns after she was doused with gasoline by her partner Dickson Ndiema. Ndiema sustained 30% burns on his body and later succumbed.
Ndiema and Cheptegei were said to have quarreled over a piece of land that the athlete bought in Kenya, according to a report filed by the local chief.
Cheptegei competed in the women’s marathon at the Paris Olympics less than a month before the attack. She finished in 44th place.
Cheptegei’s father, Joseph, said that the body will make a brief stop at their home in the Endebess area before proceeding to Bukwo in eastern Uganda for a night vigil and burial on Saturday.
“We are in the final part of giving my daughter the last respect,” a visibly distraught Joseph said.
He told reporters last week that Ndiema was stalking and threatening Cheptegei and the family had informed police.
Four in 10 women or an estimated 41% of dating or married Kenyan women have experienced physical or sexual violence perpetrated by their current or most recent partner, according to the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey 2022.
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A rare Bronze-Era jar accidentally smashed by a 4-year-old visiting a museum was back on display Wednesday after restoration experts were able to carefully piece the artifact back together.
Last month, a family from northern Israel was visiting the museum when their youngest son tipped over the jar, which smashed into pieces.
Alex Geller, the boy’s father, said his son — the youngest of three — is exceptionally curious, and that the moment he heard the crash, “please let that not be my child” was the first thought that raced through his head.
The jar has been on display at the Hecht Museum in Haifa for 35 years. It was one of the only containers of its size and from that period still complete when it was discovered.
The Bronze Age jar is one of many artifacts exhibited out in the open, part of the Hecht Museum’s vision of letting visitors explore history without glass barriers, said Inbal Rivlin, the director of the museum, which is associated with Haifa University in northern Israel.
It was likely used to hold wine or oil, and dates back to between 2200 and 1500 B.C.
Rivlin and the museum decided to turn the moment, which captured international attention, into a teaching moment, inviting the Geller family back for a special visit and hands-on activity to illustrate the restoration process.
Rivlin added that the incident provided a welcome distraction from the ongoing war in Gaza. “Well, he’s just a kid. So I think that somehow it touches the heart of the people in Israel and around the world,“ said Rivlin.
Roee Shafir, a restoration expert at the museum, said the repairs would be fairly simple, as the pieces were from a single, complete jar. Archaeologists often face the more daunting task of sifting through piles of shards from multiple objects and trying to piece them together.
Experts used 3D technology, hi-resolution videos, and special glue to painstakingly reconstruct the large jar.
Less than two weeks after it broke, the jar went back on display at the museum. The gluing process left small hairline cracks, and a few pieces are missing, but the jar’s impressive size remains.
The only noticeable difference in the exhibit was a new sign reading “please don’t touch.”
VICTORIA – The British Columbia government is partnering with a bear welfare group to reduce the number of bears being euthanized in the province.
Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of Grizzly Bear Foundation, said Monday that it comes after months-long discussions with the province on how to protect bears, with the goal to give the animals a “better and second chance at life in the wild.”
Scapillati said what’s exciting about the project is that the government is open to working with outside experts and the public.
“So, they’ll be working through Indigenous knowledge and scientific understanding, bringing in the latest techniques and training expertise from leading experts,” he said in an interview.
B.C. government data show conservation officers destroyed 603 black bears and 23 grizzly bears in 2023, while 154 black bears were killed by officers in the first six months of this year.
Scapillati said the group will publish a report with recommendations by next spring, while an independent oversight committee will be set up to review all bear encounters with conservation officers to provide advice to the government.
Environment Minister George Heyman said in a statement that they are looking for new ways to ensure conservation officers “have the trust of the communities they serve,” and the panel will make recommendations to enhance officer training and improve policies.
Lesley Fox, with the wildlife protection group The Fur-Bearers, said they’ve been calling for such a committee for decades.
“This move demonstrates the government is listening,” said Fox. “I suspect, because of the impending election, their listening skills are potentially a little sharper than they normally are.”
Fox said the partnership came from “a place of long frustration” as provincial conservation officers kill more than 500 black bears every year on average, and the public is “no longer tolerating this kind of approach.”
“I think that the conservation officer service and the B.C. government are aware they need to change, and certainly the public has been asking for it,” said Fox.
Fox said there’s a lot of optimism about the new partnership, but, as with any government, there will likely be a lot of red tape to get through.
“I think speed is going to be important, whether or not the committee has the ability to make change and make change relatively quickly without having to study an issue to death, ” said Fox.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2024.
