Over the winter we hired several people across the org:
* Alessandro Zulli (Zephyr lead)
* Jo Faraguna (Bioinformatics Engineer)
* Jake Lloyd (Research Associate)
* Jared Gurzenda (Senior Research Associate)
* Matt Benczkowski (Associate Scientist)
More details: securebio.org/blog/updates...
In collaboration with SecureBio's AI team we automated initial human review of flags. LLMs get sequencing reads, bioinformatic annotation, the ability to query BLAST to query databases, and a clear rubric, and they handle clear-cut cases well. Human review load is down ~80%.
We shared a preprint on our airplane lavatory study, collaborating with CDC and Ginkgo, where we found ~13x a higher human viral fraction. It's a preliminary result, but we're working to get access to additional airplane wastewater for further testing.
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.6...
When we spun out of MIT we moved into Tufts Launchpad Biolabs. It has been a great home for us, but as our team has continued to grow we're moving into our own space. We'll have 7,500 sqft of lab space in Kendall Sq, a short walk from our One Broadway office.
With over 16,000 nasal swabs we've seen a wide variety of viruses, and using ONT sequencing we've recovered many near-complete genomes. These let us identify the specific strains spreading here.
We also run project Zephyr, collecting nasal swabs out on the streets of Boston. We're averaging 600+ swabs weekly. You can read more in the Boston Globe:
www.bostonglobe.com/2025/12/24/b...
In November CASPER detected an unusual strain of mumps. Rich sequencing data helped us solve the puzzle: it was likely someone who got vaccinated shortly before flying to the US.
We've continued to collaborate with our CASPER partners to sequence and analyze wastewater from across the US. We recently hit a significant milestone, where the majority of metagenomic wastewater sequencing data on SRA is from CASPER.
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.6...
SecureBio Detection has a lot to share since our last update: several new preprints on our wastewater work, scaled up our nasal swab collection dramatically, we're moving into a larger lab space, and we've rebranded from the "Nucleic Acid Observatory" to "SecureBio Detection"
We hope this preprint serves as a catalyst for more untargeted wastewater metagenomics efforts, growing the systems and infrastructure needed to prevent emerging threats to human health.
Link to preprint: doi.org/10.64898/202...
This sequencing explains the seasonality of these viruses, the strains that are circulating, and the unique composition of wastewater samples by location. We demonstrate the viability of deep, untargeted wastewater metagenomics for tracking existing and novel human pathogens.
We found that this sequencing closely tracks wastewater PCR and clinical data for SARS-CoV-2, influenza A, and RSV, while simultaneously capturing emerging infections like avian influenza, West Nile, and measles.
“Deep untargeted wastewater metagenomic sequencing from sewersheds across the United States” represents half of all wastewater sequencing publicly available, and demonstrates the untapped potential of this technology.
CASPER is a national wastewater surveillance program that collected and analyzed 1,206 samples covering more than 13 million people. For this preprint, a total of 1.2 trillion read pairs were generated, which represents the largest wastewater sequencing effort ever undertaken.
Our work isn't changing. We're continuing to defend against pathogens designed to evade detection: evaluating biosurveillance approaches, developing lab and computational methods, and piloting early warning systems.
SecureBio now has two major areas of work: Detection and AI. Both teams collaborate closely, and operating under one name makes it easier to understand what we do and how the pieces fit together.
The Nucleic Acid Observatory is now SecureBio Detection. We're the same team, at the same organization, doing the same work, but the new name makes it clearer how we fit into SecureBio as a whole.
Read a longer summary on our blog (naobservatory.org/blog/airplan...) and the full preprint at www.medrxiv.org/content/10.6...
Work done in collaboration with Ginkgo Biosecurity and the CDC.
This mechanism suggests novel viruses will be easier to detect in composite airplane wastewater than expected from previous municipal wastewater studies.
Higher abundance of human-associated viruses and bacteria along with lower abundance of sewer-associated bacteria suggests a mechanism where airplane wastewater has a higher ratio of human- to sewer-derived input, boosting human viruses across the board.
Preprint: We applied untargeted viral metagenomics to composite airplane wastewater and found that human viruses had much higher relative abundance (median 13-fold) compared to municipal treatment-plant wastewater. This could substantially cut costs of using metagenomics to detect emerging viruses.
2025 was another eventful and impactful year for SecureBio's AI team – we've written up the highlights of what we accomplished and hope to build on this year.
open.substack.com/pub/securebi...
We’ve been chosen by the European Commission to build out their AI bio-eval program. 🇪🇺
We'll be carrying out this work over the next three years as part of a consortium of AI safety organizations led by @far.ai
We expanded both leadership and technical capacity, adding expertise across laboratory science, partnerships, and detection response:
Kelly Chafin, Biosecurity Response
Chris Doering, Genomic Biosecurity
Siham Elhamoumi, Partnerships
Michael Gomez, Lab Technician
James Kremer, Laboratory Science
We modeled how such a system could integrate metagenomic sequencing to detect both known and novel pathogens: naobservatory.org/blog/biothreat_radar
Metagenomic sequencing has been gaining traction, with The President’s FY 2026 Budget proposing a $52M allocation to CDC for Biothreat Radar, a new pathogen detection system.
Further, a thorough analysis of 18 months of CASPER sequencing data from Columbia, MO has been published on medRxiv: www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
