Author: inspect-ir

Frisco-based InspectIR received the FDA emergency use authorization on Friday for its breathalyzer test, which tests for organic compounds associated with COVID-19 in a person’s breath. According to a study, the tests are more effective than the rapid antigen tests available for free from the U.S. government.

The first COVID-19 diagnostic test using a sample of a patient’s breath has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. And the technology comes from a Frisco startup—impressive for a five-person team.

On Friday, InspectIR, a medical device company whose breathalyzer test was initially developed for far different uses, landed FDA emergency use authorization to begin public use of the test as the pandemic continues to ebb and flow across the country.

“As most of us have experienced, the world has changed due to the coronavirus pandemic,” said Tim Wing, InspectIR CEO, at the beginning of the pandemic. “We challenged our development teams with a simple question: ‘Can we help?’ We quickly realized our devices could identify COVID-19 in the breath and help with the unique circumstances facing the U.S. and the world right now.”

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We are excited about the future of work…and know that InspectIR and our instrument can help alleviate some of your fears.  If you are interested in learning more, please call 469.206.4555 or write info@inspect-ir.com

The First COVID-19 Breathalyzer Test Is Coming to the U.S.

COVID-19 testing has become more convenient and accessible, but with the pandemic still causing more than 30,000 new infections in the U.S. on average each week, having more ways to detect SARS-CoV-2 can go a long way toward eventually containing COVID-19.

On April 14, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration took an important step in that direction by authorizing the first breath-based test for the disease. The test isn’t designed to serve as a confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19, but as a screening tool to alert people who might be infected, in under three minutes. Anyone testing positive on the InspectIR system would need to confirm that result with a PCR-based test.

The test, developed by InspectIR Systems, based in Frisco, Tex., analyzes the gases in the breath and picks up the specific chemical signature of SARs-CoV-2 infection. Once infected, our cells produce a biological reaction that generates gases that are captured in the blood stream and transferred to the lungs and exhaled in the breath. Working with University of North Texas chemistry professor Guido Verbeck, InspectIR’s scientific team identified the breath print of SARS-CoV-2 by comparing the chemical profiles of breath samples from a few dozen people infected with COVID-19 and a similar number who were not. They found 41 differences that served as the basis for the test.

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We are excited about the future of work…and know that InspectIR and our instrument can help alleviate some of your fears.  If you are interested in learning more, please call 469.206.4555 or write info@inspect-ir.com

Meet The Founders Of The $2.7 Million Startup Behind The New Covid Breathalyzer

When the first wave of states started to legalize medical and recreational marijuana in the 2010s, Tim Wing and John Redmond envisioned a cannabis breathalyzer that could analyze samples in minutes without sending them out to a lab, similar to the ones police use to check for drunk drivers. Bootstrapped by $2.7 million cobbled together from family, friends and a handful of angel investors, the pair had the vision but lacked the chemistry credentials. To fill that skill gap, they teamed up with Guido Verbeck, a chemistry professor at the University of North Texas, to develop what Wing calls a “chemistry lab in a box.”

When the pandemic hit in March 2020, CEO Wing, 49, and president Redmond, 51, cofounders of Frisco, Texas-based InspectIR, pivoted from cannabis to Covid. Two months later they started a clinical trial, and on Thursday, the hardware and software of that portable chemistry lab – the size of a 40-lb. carry-on suitcase – received the first FDA emergency-use authorization for a breathalyzer device to detect Covid-19.

The hours since the FDA’s authorization have been a whirlwind for the duo, who first met in 2008 when they were paired together at a Texas golf tournament, where the two Midwestern transplants immediately hit it off. Wing had spent the past two decades as a sales and marketing entrepreneur starting in the early days of the internet, while Redmond has worked in human capital consulting, mainly talent acquisition and diversity, in the technology space. After their first venture, an imaging company focused on touchless temperature measurement from a distance, didn’t pan out, they launched InspectIR in 2017. “We’ve been bootstrapping and fighting like hell,” Wing told Forbes.

Their device relies on an existing technology, the miniaturized mass spectrometer. When a person breathes out, they exhale a cocktail of organic compounds, including oxygen, carbon dioxide and nitrogen.The spectrometer breaks apart the molecules of organic compounds and sorts them by size. “With viral infections, we know that the body creates chemistry, or off-gas, based on its response to fighting the virus inside our bodies at the cellular level,” Redmond says.

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We are excited about the future of work…and know that InspectIR and our instrument can help alleviate some of your fears.  If you are interested in learning more, please call 469.206.4555 or write info@inspect-ir.com

This Breath Test Can Detect Whether You Have COVID-19 in Just 3 Minutes

Rapid testing for COVID-19 has become part of many Americans’ lives since late 2021, but now, a new COVID-19 breath test might make it even more convenient to get tested. On Thursday, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an emergency use authorization for the first COVID-19 breath test that can detect chemical compounds associated with SARS-CoV-2 in just three minutes. According to the FDA, the InspectIR COVID-19 Breathalyzer is around the size of a “piece of carry-on luggage,” and can be used in locations where the patient’s sample is collected and analyzed by a qualified health care provider authorized to prescribe tests, like hospitals, mobile testing sites, and doctor’s offices.

But how accurate will the results be? The COVID-19 breath test was used in a study of 2,409 patients, a group that included those with and without COVID-19 symptoms. The breathalyzer correctly identified 91% of positive samples and 99% of negative samples. In a follow-up clinical study, the tool correctly detected the omicron variant with similar levels of accuracy. Research has found that rapid antigen tests correctly identified 93% of positive samples and 99% of negative samples, so in this sense, the breathalyzer and rapid antigen tests have similar levels of accuracy.

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We are excited about the future of work…and know that InspectIR and our instrument can help alleviate some of your fears.  If you are interested in learning more, please call 469.206.4555 or write info@inspect-ir.com

Farewell, Swabs? How a New COVID Breath Test Gives Results in 3 Minutes

A newly authorized breathalyzer test examines exhalations to quickly detect the presence of COVID-19. Learn how it works.

On Thursday, the US Food and Drug Administration authorized emergency use of the Inspectir COVID-19 Breathalyzer — a diagnostic test that uses your breath, rather than a nasal swab sample, to detect the presence of the virus. The test kit, which is roughly the size of a small suitcase, searches for chemical compounds that are found in the exhalations of people infected with COVID.

InspectIR is promoting the test as both less invasive and faster than PCR or even rapid antigen tests, making it potentially useful for public settings like offices, restaurants and airports.

In the FDA announcement of the emergency authorization, Dr. Jeff Shuren, director of the agency’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, called the device “another example of the rapid innovation occurring with diagnostic tests for COVID-19.”

Read on to learn how the Inspectir COVID-19 Breathalyzer, where it could be used and how it compares to PCD and rapid antigen tests. For more, learn how to order more free at-home COVID tests from the government and everything we know about the BA.2 subvariant and long COVID.

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We are excited about the future of work…and know that InspectIR and our instrument can help alleviate some of your fears.  If you are interested in learning more, please call 469.206.4555 or write info@inspect-ir.com