January 30, 2020 | January featured news, products, and partnerships from around the diagnostics community from numerous companies, universities, and organizations, including Charles River, TriSalus, BioIVT, and more.
Charles River Laboratories announced that it has entered into an exclusive partnership with Fios Genomics, a provider of bioinformatics data analysis services. Through this partnership, Charles River clients will have access to Fios Genomics’ expertise in bioinformatics, statistics and biology to assist in the sourcing and analysis of the high-dimensional, multi-variant datasets associated with drug development including microarrays, next-generation sequencing (NGS), proteomics, metabolomics and epigenetics as well as the associated meta-data. The biologically-relevant insights revealed by the team at Fios Genomics, combined with Charles River’s streamlined integrated drug discovery and development platform and the scientific expertise of both organizations, will enable Charles River clients to make more data-driven decisions about their programs, improving both confidence and speed. Press release
Charles River also announced a multi-year drug discovery collaboration with Takeda. Together, Charles River and Takeda will launch multiple integrated programs across Takeda’s four core therapeutic areas—oncology, gastroenterology, neuroscience, and rare disease—with the ultimate goal of delivering preclinical candidates that Takeda can advance into clinical development. The alliance combines Charles River’s extensive integrated drug discovery expertise and deep scientific bench with Takeda’s investments in human data and translation to deliver transformative medicines for patients aligned with Takeda’s therapeutic strategies in oncology, gastrointestinal disease, neuroscience and rare disease. Charles River will leverage its end-to-end drug discovery and safety assessment platform to explore potential therapeutic approaches and progress these programs towards candidate status. “By utilizing an integrated drug discovery and development approach, our goal is to deliver quality preclinical candidates to Takeda, helping to drive forward their innovative work in key therapeutic areas,” Birgit Girshick, Corporate Executive Vice President, Discovery & Safety Assessment, Biologics Testing Solutions, and Avian Vaccine Services at Charles River, said in a press release. Under the terms of the agreement, Takeda will pay Charles River a one-time, upfront fee to establish the collaboration. Charles River will be eligible to receive development payments with a potential value of over $50 million per program in preclinical and clinical milestones for candidates that progress to registration. The agreement also includes additional potential commercial milestones of up to $120 million plus royalties on launched products. Press release
Biofourmis and ImagineMIC announced a partnership agreement to drive improved outcomes and lower healthcare costs for patients with chronic conditions. The first phase of the collaboration includes integrating Biofourmis’ artificial intelligence (AI)-powered, FDA-cleared RhythmAnalytics with ImagineMIC’s remote management technology, which is monitored by clinicians located in the ImagineMIC Monitoring Intervention Center (MIC) in New York State. RhythmAnalytics, part of Biofourmis’ Biovitals Platform, uses enhanced deep learning architecture to detect dozens of cardiac arrhythmias. RhythmAnalytics will provide clinical decision support for the board-certified emergency physicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners and specialty-trained registered nurses in the MIC who perform around-the-clock monitoring of thousands of patients with chronic conditions who are in skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) and subacute care programs. “This is a scalable partnership that is starting with cardiology, which could ultimately be applied to a number of chronic conditions and therapeutic areas in various care settings by leveraging various modules within the Biovitals Platform for those applications,” said Kuldeep Singh Rajput, CEO of Biofourmis, in a press release. Press release
TriSalus announced the launch of its TriNav Infusion System (TriNav). Powered by its proprietary Pressure-Enabled Drug Delivery (PEDD) approach with SmartValve technology, TriNav is designed to help overcome the infusion barriers that limit therapeutic uptake in solid tumors, including hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and liver metastases. The TriNav System can provide interventional radiologists intravascular tumor access with improved trackability, compatibility with standard angiographic catheters and workflow comparable to standard interventions. The tumor microenvironment creates pressure barriers that limit flow into solid tumors. PEDD with SmartValve creates a high-pressure gradient that improves delivery and penetration of therapy into tumors. The porous expandable SmartValve is designed to allow antegrade flow and leverages blood flow to carry the dose deep into the solid tumor. SmartValve enables therapy delivery to the intended target while minimizing non-target delivery that has been shown to damage healthy tissue. “Tumor-directed delivery of therapeutics is an exciting opportunity to help improve outcomes across a wider range of procedures by overcoming intratumoral pressure that can prevent drugs from adequately penetrating the tumor,” said Mary Szela, President and CEO of TriSalus, in a press release. “The new TriNav Infusion System utilizes SmartValve, a first-in-kind, proprietary technology that has been shown to modulate pressure and flow with the goal for improved therapeutic delivery and deeper penetration into the tumor while helping to protect healthy tissue.” Press release
NuProbe Global and CarrierGene Biotech announced the successful completion of their recent merger and integration. The new company will operate under the English brand NuProbe Global and the Chinese brand Yue Er. “I am greatly impressed by NuProbe's technology, which is highly differentiated with unique features that are hard to mimic using alternative methods. The platform innovation can break through the current bottlenecks of the clinical genetic testing and enable new business models,” Yingshuang Chai, who is the co-founder and former CEO of CarrierGene and now serves as CEO and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the merged NuProbe, said in a press release. “After the merger, NuProbe will have exceptional research and commercial teams in both the United States and China. In addition to new products to be deployed in the US, China, and the Asia-Pacific region, our technology can help other genomics companies achieve better technical performance, go beyond homogenous competition, and accelerate the expansion of the entire genomics diagnostic market. In the past six months, we have completed the integration of the two companies’ products, finances, teams, and business, and made breakthrough progress with the development of new products.” In addition, the merged NuProbe has executed a contract for a strategic partnership with Illumina in late 2019. NuProbe and Illumina will work together in the field of clinical NGS testing for infertility and other genetic diseases. As part of the collaboration, NuProbe will develop clinical molecular diagnostic kits, including for nucleic acid extraction, library construction, and bioinformatic software. The kits will be used on Illumina’s NGS instruments, and the two companies will seek regulatory approval from NMPA.
BioIVT announced that it has been selected by upcyte technologies as the exclusive commercial worldwide distributor of its cell products and media, including cells derived from hepatocytes and liver sinusoidal endothelial cells (LSECs). upcyte technologies employs a viral gene transfer system to provoke primary cells to reproduce rapidly. It permits the controlled and reversible bypass of cell cycle control mechanisms without inducing immortalization, uncontrolled growth or altering certain relevant tissue-specific characteristics. upcyte hepatic cells offer several advantages: they are easier to culture than other cells which are commonly used for this application (e.g. HepaRG cells) and allow researchers to work with numerous hepatic cell lots from different donors. “We are pleased to be able to provide our clients with upcyte hepatic cells, which can be used for predictive toxicology evaluations and screening studies, and nicely complement our portfolio of primary hepatocytes and other liver products for in-vitro research,” said BioIVT Senior Vice President, ADME-Tox Chris Black, in a press release. “Having these cells as part of our product portfolio allows us to better serve our clients and remain the leader in high-quality innovative products for in-vitro models.” Press release
Nicoya announced the launch of Alto, the world’s first fully-automated, high-throughput benchtop surface plasmon resonance (SPR) system. As the first-ever SPR instrument to integrate digital microfluidics (DMF), artificial intelligence (AI), and nanotechnology, Alto provides high quality, label-free interaction analysis. Alto reduces the time and cost of drug discovery, enabling scientists to better understand and cure human diseases faster. Unlike other SPR instruments in the market today, Alto uses DMF technology, a liquid-handling technology capable of accurately controlling and manipulating discrete nanoliter droplets with electricity. It removes the need for any physical pumps, valves, or tubes; instead replacing them with a low-cost disposable cartridge that is compatible with the standard well-plate form factor. This enables highly accurate and repeatable measurements of kinetics and affinity, without labels and with extremely small sample volumes. Press release