下記の論文が発表されました。
「Development of a mobile laboratory system in hydrogen fuel cell buses and evaluation of the performance for COVID-19 RT-PCR testing」
水素燃料電池バスを用いた移動式検査システムの開発とCOVID-19 PCR検査への実用化の臨床評価
Miho Okude, Kenji Suzuki, Asami Naito, Akio Ebashi, Tomoka Kusama, Junichi Kiyotaki, Yusaku Akashi, Yoshihiko Kiyasu, Yoko Kurihara, Shigeyuki Notake, Masaki Takanashi, Tomokazu Setoyama, Yasushi Kawakami, Hiromichi Suzuki
Sci Rep. 2023 Oct 16;13(1):17546. doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-44925-7.
本研究は、筑波大学を中心として、各方面の御指導の下、内閣府戦略的イノベーション創出プログラム（SIP）「水素燃料電池バスを用いた防災・感染症対策システムの開発」によって実施され、英文論文として掲載されました。
本研究では、水素燃料電池バスを基盤とし、移動性と自立的電源供給機能及び検査性能をもち、短時間で大人数検査が可能な大型バス及び狭い場所でも検査可能で機動性に優れたマイクロバスの計2台の車両による感染症検査モビリティを開発し、検査性能、稼働性能について評価致しました。いずれのバスも圧倒的な検査能力、持続性に加え、迅速性を有していることが証明され、本研究の後、2022年度は2万件弱のPCR検査を実施するなど社会実装されました。
筆頭著者、奥出さんお疲れ様でした。
抄録：
We designed and developed two new types of hydrogen fuel cell (HFC) buses (motorcoach and minibus) with a mobile laboratory system. Feasibility studies have been performed for mobile laboratory testing, particularly for the laboratory performance of COVID-19 RT-PCR (PCR). We evaluated the driving range capability, PCR sample size capacity, turnaround time (TAT), and analytical performance for the detection of SARS-CoV-2. Saliva samples were used for the current study, and the analytical performance was compared with that of the reference PCR. The estimated driving range and sample size capacity of the HFC and HFC minibus were 432 km and 2847 samples, respectively, for the HFC motorcoach and 313 km and 1949 samples for the HFC minibus. For the TAT, the median time between sample submission and completion of PCR was 86 min for the motorcoach and 76 min for the minibus, and the median time between sample submission and electronic reporting of the result to each visitor was 182 min for the motorcoach and 194 min for the minibus. A secondary analysis of 1574 HFC mobile laboratory testing samples was conducted, and all negative samples were found to be negative by reference PCR. Furthermore, all samples were confirmed to be positive by reference PCR or other molecular examinations.
