LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Advanced materials engineering company Versarien announced the receipt of an independent report from Turkey's Ankara University on Wednesday, detailing the results of a preliminary study of its modified graphene materials for use against SARS-CoV-2, the strain of coronavirus that causes the Covid-19 disease.
The AIM-traded firm said the preliminary test results showed that the materials "significantly inhibit" viral infection, and possessed antiviral activity towards SARS-CoV-2.

It said the study was undertaken to test, in a laboratory environment, the hypothesis that graphene nanoplatelets doped with metal oxide nanoparticles, as produced by Versarien, could inactivate the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus.

Two graphene nanoplatelet batches doped with different metal oxide nanoparticles, 'GNA-22' and 'GNA-24', were provided by Versarien to a team led by Dr Acelya Yilmazer Aktuna at Ankara University.

Those doped materials were produced using technology from the company's subsidiary 'Gnanomat', and were then separately dispersed in a phosphate buffer solution by Ankara University and provided to an external biosafety level 3 laboratory for testing.

In order to determine the antiviral effect of the materials provided, the level of inhibition of viral infection was assessed.

Testing was carried out on VeroE6 cells containing SARS-CoV-2, and viral copy numbers were analysed in real time to demonstrate the level of SARS-CoV-2 inhibition of the aqueous suspensions of GNA-22 and GNA-24, compared to control samples not exposed to those modified graphene materials.

Initial results showed a log 4 reduction of SARS-CoV-2 using GNA-22 of approximately 99.99% inhibition, and a log 2 reduction using GNA-24 of approximately 99% inhibition.

Those results were described by the company as "statistically highly significant".

The report concluded that the results showed that GNA-22 and GNA-24 significantly inhibited viral infection, and suggested that the materials possessed antiviral activity towards SARS-CoV-2.

"While we must stress that these results have been achieved under laboratory conditions, they do demonstrate that our hybrid graphene nanomaterials have the potential to provide protection from Covid-19," said chief executive officer Neill Ricketts.

"The results provide us with sufficient levels of confidence for our combined Gnanomat and 2-DTech teams to move to rapid testing of these materials in real-world applications as diverse as face masks, clothing and surface treatments, together with investigating the protection that they can provide from other viruses and bacteria."

At 1227 GMT, shares in Versarien were up 4.9% at 35.67p.

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