Promis Diagnostics

At Promis Diagnostics, I found the startup environment extremely fruitful since I gained exposure to all aspects of the biotech industry. Upon joining the team, I carried out similar automated extraction protocols which included sample processing for a COVID-19 assay. However, the team experienced an accessioning bottleneck that reduced the testing capacity of the lab. Within a few weeks, I learned the ins-and-outs of Microsoft’s Power Automate program to increase overall testing capacity from ~200 samples to ~1500 samples daily by reducing the time of accessioning into a Laboratory Information and Management System(LIMS). The evolution of Promis Diagnostics’ patient requisition and result delivery system is one that I keep in my biotech career highlight reel. From engineering an application for COVID-19 sample collection sites, to creating an automated text and email result delivery system, I am proud that I was able to self learn through publicly available resources to successfully alleviate pressure on my team members and meet patient demands.My involvement in the colorectal cancer assay was during the pilot study stages where I worked with two other lab members to process over 1400 stool samples. I was hands-on from the point of patient data entry, through to the very last step of determining the Ct-value of the amplification of methylated Syndecan-2. Needless to say, I am a prolific stool DNA extractor. My expertise revolves around epigenetic based techniques from nucleic acid extraction to bisulfite conversion, and downstream Linear Targeted Enrichment-qualitative methylation specific real time PCR(LTE-qMSP). More recently, I was in charge of the development of the UTI assay. The UTI assay allowed me to independently practice my experimental design skills ranging from adequacy, repeatability, stability, and mixed flora experiments. With a 16 pathogen panel, it was extremely tedious to manually prepare 384-well plates for Polymerase chain reaction(PCR). I found the notion of manual PCR plating for future clinical use to be an unbearably severe bottleneck, so my current project is creating a 10ul and 5ul automated plating protocols on the Hamilton Starlet Liquid Handler.