*********************************
There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
*********************************
In early 2020, Georgia Tech researchers designed a saliva-based polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test and encouraged community members to test weekly to track the health of the campus during the Covid-19 pandemic. Their strategy confirmed 62% of the campus's positive cases in the fall 2020 semester. The method of surveillance testing — focusing on case clusters and then having patients isolate — reduced positivity rates from 4.1% in the beginning of the semester to below 0.5% mid-semester. Their findings were published in the journal Epidemiology. Joshua Weitz, Professor and Tom and Marie Patton Chair in the School of Biological Sciences, developed the infectious disease models used to monitor the campus and is a co-author of the study, along with Greg Gibson, professor in the School of Biological Sciences, and Conan Zhao, research technician with the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Quantitative Biosciences. (This coverage also appeared in The Medical News.)
