East Coast fever (ECF) 

Outcomes

Partners• We applied the latest gene editing technology, CRISPR, and its 
associated Cas protein to develop a pen-side test for ECF.

• The test has been adapted to field or farm testing by including 
an isothermal (RPA) pre-amplification step and a lateral flow 
strip readout format.

• ECF is a tick-borne disease that kills 1 cow every 30 seconds, 
with annual economic losses of over USD 500 million. 

• The current diagnostic tests are impractical for farm-level or 
pen-side diagnosis and lack sensitivity to pick infections early 
for proper treatment.

Title/role: * PhD fellow 
Email addresses: R.muriuki@cgiar.org, N.Svitek@cgiar.org

Novel CRISPR-Cas-powered 
pen-side test for East Coast fever

Authors:  Robert Muriuki*,  Maingi Ndichu ,Samuel Githigia Nicholas Svitek     

Our innovative approach
Next steps

• First ever CRISPR-Cas pen-side test for the diagnosis of 
Theileria parva infections in cattle.

• This pen-side test is highly specific and can detect one T. 
parva-infected cell per 3 µl of blood and up to eight different 
T. parva field isolates. 

• The utilization of the test can be easily carried out using 
simple instruments like a boiling pot of water, and results are 
achievable in under two hours.  

• Two more CRISPR-Cas-based pen-side 
tests have been developed for 
Anaplasmosis and Babesiosis.

• A multiplex test will be developed to 
enable the simultaneous detection of 
these three tick-borne diseases.

• The next step will be to scale up these 
tests for development into widely 
accessible commercial products.

, , ,  , , ,  

(https://mammoth.bio/2019/06/10/the-cas-proteins-behind-crispr-diagnostics/)

RPA/Cas12a Specificity for Anaplasma marginale.