Webinar title: Construction of Biosafety Protection System: Human Body-Host-Environment

Speaker: Prof. Lei Zhou

Time: May 27, 2024 (Monday) 14:00

Venue: Room 200, New Environmental Building

Inviter: Zehui Li, Yongping Huang


Abstract:

The biosafety protection system is an important part of the national security concept, involving multiple-pathogen monitoring and multi-site triggering in disease control emergencies, multiple-disease prevention and smart customs control in customs prevention and control, and enhancing the new combat capability in military biological protection. Building on the rapid detection of biosafety events with humans at the core, moving the focus to host monitoring and environmental perception is the core of the "prevention is better than cure" biosafety protection system. Point-of-Care Monitoring and Testing (POC-MT) as the most vibrant subfield in the field of biosafety, with the integration of microfluidics, nanomaterials, and smart sensors, has brought breakthroughs in technology product performance that are more real-time, wide-ranging, high-precision, and early-warning. From groundbreaking original innovations to the construction of specific population scenarios, innovation transformation and measurement testing are essential links. In terms of innovation transformation, interdisciplinary integration is an important way for original innovation. Using microfluidic chips as reaction carriers, nanomaterials to drive signal display, and smart sensors to support quantitative extraction, it has achieved single-cell imaging and absolute counting at the level of "one cell", optical identification of single bacteria and establishment of databases at the level of "one bacterium", rapid and ultra-sensitive nucleic acid detection at the level of "one copy", and macroscopic trend sensing and early warning decision-making at the level of "one network". Subsequently, through product definition, process improvement, quality control establishment, and quantitative production, the transformation of innovative technologies into mature products is promoted. In terms of measurement testing, third-party inspection and testing platforms are important support for the innovation and development of new technologies and products, measurement calibration, and mass production quality control. Using high-level biosafety laboratories (protection level P3+) for biosafety protection and aerosol simulation cabins for biological aerosol support, a high-level biosafety laboratory for biosecurity/biodetection/biomonitoring equipment performance evaluation has been established, obtaining CNAS/CMA authoritative third-party inspection and monitoring certification. Providing measurement calibration, inspection, and testing support to the biosafety protection equipment system from innovative achievements to capability building.


About the speaker:

Dr. Lei Zhou is a member of the Standing Committee of the Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences. She serves as the group leader of the Biochemical Engineering State Key Laboratory, the deputy director of the Key Laboratory of the PLA for Biopharmaceutical Manufacturing and Formulation Engineering, and the director of the Zhangjiagang Yangtze River Delta Biosafety Research Center. She is the Chief Scientist of the dual projects "Biosafety" and "Food Safety" under the Key Research and Development Program of the Ministry of Science and Technology. Since 2001, she has been engaged in research and industrialization of new bio-detection and monitoring technologies, focusing on the research direction of "Exploration of new bio-detection and monitoring technologies based on nano materials and bio-device applications". Over more than twenty years of research, based on the interdisciplinary research thinking and the innovative mode of "collaboration of production, learning, research, and application", she has extensively explored the bio-application value of materials and devices such as up-conversion luminescent materials, carbon quantum dots, structural electrodes, and communication optical fibers, and has established a number of original innovative bio-detection technologies. In the past five years, she has led the approval of longitudinal projects exceeding 1.3 billion yuan, with government and industrial investment totaling over 1.2 billion yuan. She has been granted more than 30 domestic and international patents, with intellectual property protection covering 10 countries and regions. She has led the development of six group standards in biosafety. As a co-first contributor, she has obtained 21 medical device registration certificates and 10 CE certifications, with annual sales exceeding 100 million yuan in 2015. She ranked second and has received several awards including the 2015 National Technology Invention Second Prize. She ranked first and won the first prize of the 2023 China Industry-University-Research Cooperation Innovation Achievement Award.