A ‘high-tech’ mask with freeze-dried sensors finds Covid within 90 minutes. That’s the result of a study coordinated by the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering and Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, and published in the journal Nature Biotechnology. “Super Mask” will require no user interaction other than pressing a button.

The “super-mask,” for now, scientists have only developed one tissue, but the goal is clear, “is the result of integrating synthetic biology into wearable devices and could expand opportunities for pathogen monitoring — the study explains — to operate synthetic circuits that generally require live, engineered bacteria, This has limited its application in wearable devices.”

The technology developed by the scientists provides “light, flexible, functional substrates and fabrics with freeze-dried, cell-free industrial circuits, including instruments based on Crispr (DNA ‘cut-and-sew’ system) technology. They are capable of detecting disease-causing metabolites, chemicals, and nucleic acids.”

A big step towards the “smart” mask.