A highly sensitive tool that detects a disease that affects shrimps has been developed at the University of Santo Tomas (UST). The technology helps detect Acute Hepatopancreatic Necrosis Disease (AHPND) or Early Mortality Syndrome in shrimp. It is 10 times more highly sensitive compared with Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), the convention detection tool. PCR is used in molecular biology to magnify into thousands and even millions of copies a particular DNA sequence. Because it is a relatively easy, comparatively cheap and reliable way to repeatedly replicate a segment of DNA, PCR is probably the most widely used technique in molecular biology and biomedical research, in clinical as well as research laboratories.

Icamina, P. (2018, April 10). Affordable test for shrimp disease. Malaya Business Insight, p. A2.