Mass Spectrometry for COVID-19

Abstract

In the United States, response to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic has been hampered by inadequate testing resources for the causative virus SARS-CoV-2. In the early part of the pandemic, United States laboratories were initially heavily regulated and slow to provide testing. As the pandemic has progressed, the supply chain for instruments and reagents has been inconsistent and has revealed weaknesses in traditional sophisticated infectious disease testing. Testing capabilities of clinical laboratories could be substantially improved by assays that are more simplified and do not require multiple consumable reagents for extraction, purification, amplification and detection. One such technology with the potential to require minimal reagents is matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization combined with mass spectrometry (MALDI-MS). Recently, Nachtigall and colleagues reported the development of a MALDI-MS method for the diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 infection (1).