Concentrated biopsy
Phase Scientific creates a "blood concentrate" for rapid cancer diagnosis
Yulia Krasilnikova, Hi-tech+
A Hong Kong company is developing an innovative system for preparing tests for a liquid biopsy – fast and painless. Experts are still in doubt, but investors are already ready to invest millions of dollars in projects.
Search for hidden DNA
Hong Kong startup Phase Scientific is working on a technology for preparing biomaterials for liquid biopsy, a painless procedure for diagnosing various types of cancer.
It is assumed that in people with oncological diseases, the tumor at an early stage secretes biomarkers that can be identified by a blood or urine sample. A number of studies prove the effectiveness of liquid biopsy, but only for certain types of cancer and at a certain stage of the disease development.
Oncologists are skeptical about this practice. In their opinion, malignant tumors secrete such a small number of cells into the blood that it is impossible to diagnose them.
So, at an early stage of the disease, the fragments secreted by the tumor make up no more than one hundredth of a percent of the DNA in the patient's blood.
Previously, such a technique was presented by a German company Qiagen. In Hong Kong, they claim that they have improved it. It allows you to get "concentrated analyses", which contain four times more DNA particles than usual. In addition, it is much easier to differentiate the fragments secreted by tumor cells in the prepared blood.
The company has already proven the effectiveness of its method on 20 blood samples. In the coming months, Phase Scientific will test its technology on 100 samples already.
Market prospects
Startup founder Ricky Chiu Yinto compares a liquid biopsy to finding mistakes in a book. "Modern methods can be compared with the search for grammatical errors among all the books in the library. Our technology allows you to reduce the search to several pages," he noted in the SCMP comment.
Investors have already become interested in Phase Scientific research. Since its foundation in 2012, the company has raised $12 million.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, as well as the National Science Foundation and the US National Institutes of Health have invested in the project.
Although the possibilities of liquid biopsy are still limited, and its effectiveness has not been proven by large-scale studies, the industry is growing rapidly. Transparency Market Research estimates that the market for cancer diagnostics using non-invasive methods will grow to $9 billion by 2026.
However, the similarity of a liquid biopsy is used not only to detect tumors. In the USA, clinical trials are already underway for a procedure that allows determining the condition of the fetus during IVF by analyzing the DNA of the embryo extracted from amniotic fluid (amniotic fluid).
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