A biomarker discovery and diagnostics startup has been awarded £860,000 in funding from Innovate UK.
The investment for Tagomics comes as part of the Biomedical Catalyst programme for the testing and development of innovative healthcare solutions from the UK’s innovation agency.
The £860,000 grant forms part of a £1.2m project to customise the Cambridge-based firm’s multiomic profiling platform for early detection of colorectal cancer. Tagomics itself will contribute the remaining funding.
The company’s Interlace platform is a novel workflow that unlocks disease-associated DNA biomarkers.
The Biomedical Catalyst grant will be used to apply Interlace to the detection of genetic and epigenetic mutations associated with colorectal cancer.
TikTok to open new London office after reaching 30m UK users
A pilot study of the diagnostic test for the early detection of colorectal cancer in a clinical patient cohort will be led by Dr Arash Assadsangabi, consultant physician and gastroenterologist at Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust, in collaboration with the Northern Care Alliance Research Collection biobank.
The study will profile 250 patients suspected of having colorectal cancer to validate identified biomarkers and demonstrate the use of multiomic profiling for early detection of disease.
“We are delighted to have been awarded the Biomedical Catalyst grant as part of the Innovate UK programme, recognising the potential of our multiomic workflow in novel diagnostic and therapeutic technologies,” said Dr Robert Neely, CSO and co-founder of Tagomics.
“We believe that the unique, information-rich dataset that Interlace provides us will be pivotal in detecting colorectal cancer at the earliest possible stages of development, enabling treatment of the cancer when it is most vulnerable to modern therapeutics, with the aim of dramatically improving patient outcomes.”
Following successful completion of the project, Tagomics will further expand the capabilities and applications of Interlace with the support of Agilent Technologies.
Dr Rita Shaknovich, chief medical officer at Agilent Technologies, added: “The Biomedical Catalyst grant is a fantastic achievement for Tagomics, reflecting the enormous potential for its novel multiomics workflow in the early detection of cancers.
“We look forward to continuing our collaboration with Tagomics and supporting the development of new applications for the Interlace platform, which brings together the strengths of Tagomics’ epigenetics platform with Agilent’s SureSelect target enrichment solutions, furthering cancer research and ultimately aiming to improve patient outcomes.”