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Luminex Wins US Award For Covid-19 Antibody Test Project

Luminex has won an award of $683,500 from the US Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) to advance the development of its Covid-19 multiplex antibody test.

The award is for a project for Luminex’s (LMNX) so-called xMAP SARS-CoV-2 Multi-Antigen IgG Assay, which aims to demonstrate if the test could show that individuals are protected against future infection or that past infections provide protection against future SARS-CoV-2 infections. The company seeks to submit the enhanced serology assay for Emergency Use Authorization once the project is completed.

The xMAP SARS-CoV-2 Multi-Antigen IgG Assay detects antibodies to three different viral antigens – the spike protein, nucleocapsid, and receptor-binding domain – to test if a person has been infected with SARS-CoV-2. In the BARDA-funded project, information from all three antigens will be integrated to provide a more comprehensive view of a person’s immune status. Luminex hopes that the combination of all of this information in one assay, will create a test that not only identifies prior infection, but also assesses the neutralizing activity of the immune response.

As people return to work, students head back to school, and vaccines become available, communities will need to understand the extent to which past infections provide protection against future SARS-CoV-2 infections, the company said.

“In addition to our SARS-CoV-2 tests that detect active coronavirus infections, we believe that advanced serology assays will be instrumental in understanding who has been infected,” said Nachum Shamir CEO of Luminex. “We appreciate BARDA’s support as we continue to develop solutions that can help improve patient outcomes during this global pandemic.”

The currently available xMAP SARS-CoV-2 Multi-Antigen IgG Assay delivers results for up to 96 patient samples in less than four hours. The assay has demonstrated specificity of 100% in human serum and greater than 99% in human plasma, with sensitivity greater than 96% for both human serum and plasma (more than 14 days post-symptom onset) in clinical studies. The assay, which can be run on any of Luminex’s xMAP-based high-throughput platforms, uses advanced multiplexing capabilities to reduce the risk of false positives and false negatives, Luminex said. The US Food and Drug Administration granted Emergency Use Authorization for this assay on July 20 this year.

Shares in Luminex, which have dropped 17% over the past month are still up 8.4% on a year-to-date basis. Looking ahead, the $43 average analyst price target implies a promising 71% upside potential lies ahead.

The two analysts recently covering LMNX, which are Piper Sandler’s William Quirk and BTIG’s Sung Ji Nam, both have a Buy rating on the stock. (See LMNX stock analysis on TipRanks)

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Sharon Wrobel
Sharon Wrobel is a journalist and writer with two decades of experience covering financial news in the U.S., Europe and the Middle East. Her work has appeared in global publications including The Financial Times, Bloomberg and The Jerusalem Post.

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