The collaboration spawns from Abcodia’s academic biomarker programme, which aims to partner with the world’s leading academic centers to assess candidate biomarkers for potential use in the early detection or screening of cancer.
Through Abcodia’s exclusive access to a unique longitudinal collection of serum samples derived from a population cohort involved in the UKCTOCS trial, Abcodia and AIT will work closely to design a series of longitudinal studies to validate panels of biomarkers for lung cancer and colorectal cancer. The collaboration aims to generate a package of data that will support the licensing of the IP to a commercial partner.
Chris Hodkinson, Chief Operating Officer for Abcodia, said: "I am delighted to be able to announce that we will be collaborating with the Austrian Institute of Technology. AIT’s Molecular Diagnostics Group has a high reputation for their work in developing cancer biomarkers and has already filed patents for tumour biomarkers in lung and colorectal cancer. I hope that our partnership will advance these biomarkers for cancer screening by assessing how early they can be detected before clinical diagnosis.”
Martin Weber, Head of the business unit Molecular Diagnostics at AIT, said: "The collaboration with Abcodia is an excellent fit for us. Abcodia’s expertise in longitudinal designs using the UKCTOCS sample bank, knowledge of cancer screening and links with other commercial companies will prove invaluable in helping us advance our early stage markers towards commercialisation and clinical use."
ABOUT THE AUSTRIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
The AIT Austrian Institute of Technology is Austria's largest non-university research institute and is among the European research institutes a specialist in the key infrastructure issues of the future. The Molecular Diagnostics business unit focusses on biomarkers, assay development, bioinformatics and diagnostic biosensors and has several patents on biomarkers for cancer. The group combines innovative high throughput technologies (e.g. next generation sequencing, real-time PCR, microarrays) with their own in-house workflow-based data analysis tools to support partners and customers in the ultimate goal of defining biomarkers for personalized medicine and early disease detection.
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