A Guilford biotech firm was named one of the winners in a $6 million global competition to develop better ways to test for COVID-19.
U-Smell-It LLC, a company specializing in innovative COVID-19 detection techniques, announced Tuesday that it was one of the winners of the XPRIZE Rapid Covid Testing competition, a six-month effort to develop faster, cheaper and easier-to-use COVID-19 testing methods at scale.
U-Smell-It won on the “Open Innovation Track,” for firms “whose approaches demonstrated high potential for impactful screening solutions.”
“This award is an honor,” said Dr. Derek Toomre, Yale University School of Medicine professor and founder of U-Smell-It. “But the real honor will come when this test helps keep people healthy, helps keep schools open, and enables economies to thrive.”
The U-Smell-It test detects when a patient has lost their sense of smell, a common symptom of COVID-19. The test involves a card with five scent areas, such as banana and mint, with results ready in 45 seconds.
