Every cancer is unique because everyone is unique, and one of the most important weapons in any cancer fight is information Isabl provides a lot of information by rapidly sequencing the entire genome of cancer cells, and it is possible to show which treatments will work and which will not in a few days
At present, the company has obtained a breakthrough designation from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and raised $3 million to bring its method to the market.
In the past 10 years, the commercialization of genomic processes from sequencing to analysis has brought many medical advances, and cancer treatment is no exception. In fact, because cancer is a kind of gene mutation that has been out of control, understanding these genes is a particularly promising research direction.
The team tested the DNA of cancer cells for mutations in hundreds of genes known to affect prognosis and clinical strategies. For example, a cancer may have some mutations that make it easy to receive radiotherapy, but it is resistant to chemotherapy, or vice versa - it is very helpful to understand these mutations.
Elli papaemmanuil, co-founder and CEO of isabl, points out that no matter how helpful the tests are, they are just the beginning. "These tests are very carefully designed to look for the most common mutations, and they have revolutionized cancer diagnosis in ordinary cancer patients. But patients with rare cancer - and we still define rare cancer as one-third of patients - have not benefited from it," she said
Even many people with common cancers may find that their condition does not involve mutations in these most predictive genes. The relevant genes are somewhere in the other 2 billion base pairs - current tests only look at about 1% of the genome.
Although there are other 99% technologies, compared with the panel, it is expensive and slow in history, and the analysis of a large amount of data is also difficult and time-consuming. But isabl's tests show that it's definitely worth it.
Genome sequencing can detect more clinically relevant findings. "What we're doing is developing a platform that allows us to summarize it in a way that doctors can read and use in a day," papaemmanuil said They call it "clinically operable genome-wide and transcriptome testing (cwgts)".
The company was founded by papaemmanuil's research at Memorial Sloan Kettering, cancer care and Science Center in New York. "You can see all these successes from group tests, and then all these patients who didn't benefit. But in my lab, we have technology and knowledge," she recalls. It is reported that they collected and combined three different data sets: the genome of germline (i.e. patient), the genome of tumor and its transcriptome.
"This gives a true picture of the tumor profile. Instead of having a classifier or a model to annotate mutations, we have an analytical method that integrates these three layers to explain the role of mutations and their correlation with each tumor type," papaemmanuil said
Although it has the whole process from sampling to reporting, the key progress of isabl is based on data, so "there are no technical obstacles to providing this solution today. And we have proved that we can do it on a large scale," papaemmanuil said. But in the medical world, being able to do it does not mean being allowed to do it. The FDA has granted the technology "breakthrough" status, which is a fast track - but even the fast track is slow in the federal government.
Although full clinical approval may take 3-5 years, it is much faster than the industry's estimated 5-10 years for this type of application.
Papaemmanuil said: "the seed round financing is largely for us to make a roadmap - it is a good starting point to obtain the necessary evidence and approval. We have cooperated with cancer centers to carry out research, and most importantly, listen to oncologists, understand what they need and how they want to obtain data."
This round of $3 million financing is led by two sigma ventures, with the participation of Y combinator, box 1 and other companies. Papaemmanuil's co founders are chief technology officer Juan Santiago Medina and Andrew Kung.
In addition, she made it clear that isabl's research would be conducted publicly. "These data should be published and made available in a form that allows further research. Self reinforcing games that produce and identify predictive data can prove to be an incredibly valuable resource in many disciplines."
Isabl is an example of the power of more or less pure data games in an industry often associated with laboratory progress - of course, it first requires a lot of laboratory work to produce. However, when the automation of key processes leads to a significant increase in data acquisition, it is always valuable. In this case, this value can save many lives.