CRISPR–Cas12-based detection of SARS-CoV-2

An outbreak of betacoronavirus severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)-CoV-2 began in Wuhan, China in December 2019. COVID-19, the disease associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection, rapidly spread to produce a global pandemic. We report development of a rapid (<40 min), easy-to-implement and accurate CRISPR–Cas12-based lateral flow assay for detection of SARS-CoV-2 from respiratory swab RNA extracts. We validated our method using contrived reference samples and clinical samples from patients in the United States, including 36 patients with COVID-19 infection and 42 patients with other viral respiratory infections. Our CRISPR-based DETECTR assay provides a visual and faster alternative to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention SARS-CoV-2 real-time RT–PCR assay, with 95% positive predictive agreement and 100% negative predictive agreement. SARS-CoV-2 in patient samples is detected in under an hour using a CRISPR-based lateral flow assay.