Estimating the R-value of coronavirus from wastewater
The R-value, i.e. the reproductive number of SARS-CoV-2, is a valuable parameter for public health officials when monitoring the dynamic and spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. This value is typically based on clinical data. A new study led by Tanja Stadler’s group in collaboration with researchers from Eawag and ETH Lausanne now demonstrates with field data from Zurich and San Jose, CA, USA that the R-value can also be estimated from wastewater - with great precision, quickly and cost-effectively.
This research is funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF). Find external pageSNSF media releasecall_made issued on 15.12.2021.
The study is published on medRxiv, a preprint server for not-yet peer-reviewed research.
Find the original publication:
Huisman, J S, J Scire, L Caduff, X Fernandez-Cassi, P Ganesanandamoorthy, A Kull, A Scheidegger, E Stachler, A B Boehm, B Hughes, A Knudson, A Topol, K R Wigginton, M K Wolfe, T Kohn, C Ort, T Stadler, and T R Julian (2021) Wastewater-based estimation of the effective reproductive number of SARS-CoV-2. medRxiv 2021.04.29.21255961; external pagehttps://doi.org/10.1101/2021.04.29.21255961call_made
Learn about research in the Computational Evolution group led by Tanja Stadler.