Non-existent biotechnology before that. Cape received his PhD. at McGill in 1967 with John Spencer as supervisor, who was one of the pioneers of DNA biochemistry. At the same time, Cape President of Professional Pharmaceutical Corporation in Montreal.
The worldwide approach used to verify the presence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that culprits COVID-19 is known as polymer or PCR chain reaction. This revolutionary innovation evolved in Cetus through in-house scientist Kary Mullis. Winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1993, Mullis won the only Nobel Prize for a discovery made through a biotechnology company.
DNA generation was the key strategy of Cetus’ business plan when the company was founded through Cape and its partners. In 1983, Kary Mullis discovered a method to exponentially magnify the EXPRESS DNA sequences in the control tube. He called it a polymer chain reaction.
Its key concept is to use a high-temperature active enzyme to copy DNA. This DNA copy enzyme, known as Taq polymer DNA, was discovered through David Gelfand and Susanne Stoffel in Cetus.
Amplify DNA
Biologist James Watson and physicist Francis Crick described the design of DNA in 1953: two solid strands in a double helix design. Each strand of DNA is aligned anti-parallel (parallel but in opposite directions) with the complementary strand, maintained in combination through the so-called hydrogen bonds. These bonds are damaged by heat.
Mullis then sought to find a way to make multiple copies of DNA that, in turn, could be used to produce the proteins Cetus sought to market as cancer therapies. His concept was to design an approach to make this DNA from the Taq polymer.
Mullis has developed a protocol of variable temperatures and repeated cycles to magnify DNA. First he used a maximum temperature to separate the double strands of DNA. Lowering the temperature allowed the TAq polymera DNA to copy and enlarge the sequences along the DNA chains. Once a copy cycle was completed, the temperature was raised again to separate the strands and allow some other amplification cycle to continue.
With Cetus, Mullis designed a machine, the thermocycler, to allow the repetition of these cycles to produce exponential amounts of DNA, much like a nuclear chain reaction, hence the term polymerwork chain reaction.
PCR and SARS-CoV-2 tests
SARS-CoV-2 genes are stored as RNA, not DNA. The popular control protocol is to take a deep nasal smear from a patient. To trip over the virus through PCR-based controls, the virus’s RNA is copied into the DNA of some other enzyme called the opposite transcriptase. It is this copied DNA that is used for PCR amplification.
The urgency of a cure for COVID-19 has complex clinical discoveries at an accelerated rate. On January 11, the SARS-CoV-2 gene series was made for Chinese scientists to have. On 24 January, the World Health Organization created PCR-based protocols to check SARS-CoV-2.
The legacy of Montrealer Ron Cape and the first biotechnology company is the PCR we use to stumble upon COVID-19 disease.
The Canadian National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg has implemented SARS-CoV-2 verification for COVID-19 in knowledge distributed through WHO in January 2020 for PCR verifications.
The Public Health Agency of Canada regulates the National Microbiology Laboratory. PHAC was created in 2004 after the 2003 SARS outbreak, following a devastating report through David Naylor, then Dean of Medicine at the University of Toronto, on Canada’s lack of preparedness for the fatal SARS outbreak.
Unfortunately, many of the detailed recommendations for preparing for a fatal virus have never been implemented. The last sentence of the 2003 report on page 221 is scary to read today: “If not now, after SARS, when?”
Advancing Canada’s Experience
Screening is our only way to find out who’s been infected, where and when. The lack of consistency and standardization of testing and reporting of effects is now unacceptable despite the recommendations of the 2003 SARS report.
Genome Canada is home to exceptionally talented scientists whose experience is genome mapping. The firm is making heroic efforts to get Canada to respond to COVID-19.
Using Genome Canada’s testing experience through its six genomic centers can fill the gap in complete, accurate and ongoing testing and reporting for the planned upcoming SARS-CoV-2 outbreak or pandemic.