US-based SomaLogic has partnered with Children’s Hospital Colorado to develop diagnostic tests for childhood diseases.
Both the companies will work together to discover protein biomarkers, which will be used to develop laboratory tests to improve the diagnosis and management of childhood diseases.
The development work will be carried out using SomaLogic’s proteomics SOMAscan assay. It is capable of measuring about thousand proteins in a small amount of blood or other biological samples.
Dr Robin Deterding will lead the research team, who is the Children’s Colorado breathing institute director, University of Colorado School of Medicine pediatrics department pulmonary medicine professor and North American Children’s Interstitial and Diffuse Lung Disease Research Network (CHILDRN) chair.
Dr Deterding said: "We have a unique ‘game changing’ opportunity to rapidly discover and apply blood-based protein biomarkers for the early diagnosis of rare and common pediatric lung diseases, but also for the diagnosis, prognosis and monitoring of many other childhood diseases."
As part of the deal, the researchers will analyze the proteins from blood samples obtained from children suffering from disease.
Following this, proteins or biomarkers, whose change in concentration is correlated with disease will be selected. These will be used to develop in-house diagnostic tests for future clinical use.
Image: Children’s Colorado breathing institute director Robin Deterding will lead the research team. Photo: courtesy of Business Wire.