Bioinformatics students part of winning Boston Hack-a-thon team

Two doctoral students from the College of Computing and Informatics Department of Bioinformatics and Genomics, Adriano Schneider and Gregorio Linchangco, and visiting research scholar, Dennis Jacob Machado, were part of the winning team that participated in the Zika Innovation Hack-a-thon in Boston.

The three UNC Charlotte researchers were teamed up with engineers and clinicians and were tasked to develop a solution to ensure optimal concentration of larvicides in domestic water supplies with minimal human intervention and a safe manner. A larvicide is an insecticide that targets the larval stage of an insect.

The UNC Charlotte team project, a Larvicide Automated Dispenser (LAD), received “Most Implementable Solution” at the event, sponsored by the GE Foundation.

The device has the potential to help control mosquito borne diseases, such as Zika, Chikungunya, Dengue, and Malaria, and, at the same time, reduce health care costs in countries affected by them, according to the researchers.

“Working with this team was an amazing experience,” said Ph.D. student Schneider. “It showed all the power of those from different backgrounds working together toward the same goal, to combat Zika.”

Fifteen teams, comprised of engineers, clinicians, biologists, and researchers, competed in the hack-a-thon. In addition to UNC Charlotte, MIT, Merck, GE Foundation, Cornell, Harvard, Uganda health officials, Brazilian health officials (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and FIOCRUZ) and Massachusetts General Hospital physicians competed.