DeepVerge posts positive results of Covid-19 tests on lab-grown skin

DeepVerge announced interim results from its Labskin partnership with the University of Aberdeen on Friday, following analysis of a study to investigate the behaviour of the SARS-CoV-2 virus on Labskin's cloned human skin microbiome, to enable testing of Covid-19 anti-viral and dental products.

The AIM-traded firm said Labskin scientists successfully populated and maintained the SARS-CoV-2 virus on skin models, creating a “breakthrough environment” that enabled testing of household chemicals, anti-viral products, skin and health care products, and their effect on the human skin microbiome, as well as their efficacy at killing the virus over long periods of time.

It said the DeepVerge study was designed to investigate the transmissibility from surfaces to airways via skin, by measuring its viability when recovered from surfaces to skin, and skin-to-skin.

The study was also designed to look at which sanitisers killed the virus on skin, the reduction of titre and virulence, the ability of the virus to activate innate immune response on the human living tissue, and how long the virus lived on skin.

DeepVerge said the results validated Labskin's ability to provide access to real-world clones of the human skin microbiome, while removing the risk of transmission of the virus to human volunteers.

It explained that for the first time, in safety, clients could test their products, ingredients, treatments and therapies on SARS-CoV-2 and potentially other dangerous viruses and pathogens in real-world environments.

DeepVerge said it had now extended the investigation, and would include viability of the virus when transferred as full coronavirus particles from plastic and metal surfaces to the laboratory-grown human skin model, and the potential risk for infection through the skin.

It would also investigate the ability of SARS-CoV-2 to activate innate immune response on the Labskin model, and its ability to reproduce on the skin and how long it remained viable, and therefore infectious.

“Society has depended on anecdotal or theoretical evidence to determine how infectious skin is, as humans touch surfaces and each other,” said chief executive officer Gerard Brandon.

“The work in Aberdeen provides factual data and empirical evidence of surface to skin and skin to skintransferability to provide quantifiable infection risks.

“The body of research, protocols and methods created on Labskin, working with the real virus, offers confirmation and sets standards that allow for testing of our client's anti-viral household, skin and health care products, so that consumers are given scientific evidence behind products claims to kill or address the risk of transmission of the virus.”

Brandon said Labskin was now a proxy skin environment for “deep” research and testing, beyond Labskin laboratories, with its partners in universities in Liverpool, Genoa and Shanghai.

“The extended scientific community can monitor how long the virus remains viable on the skin and provide empirical proof of viral load over the length of time that the virus survives - to show how vulnerable and infectious a human can be in their daily interactions and activities.”

At 1156 GMT, shares in DeepVerge were up 3.19% at 29.15p.