NEW YORK – Bioinformatic analysis startup Constantiam Biosciences said on Monday that it has been awarded a $2.05 million Phase II Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant from the US National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI).
Constantiam Cofounder Norman Ong said in an email that the company will use the two-year grant to support the research and development of the firm's functional analysis platform for variants of uncertain significance (VUS).
Dubbed Varify, the platform aims to reclassify VUS at scale by leveraging Multiplexed Assays of Variant Effect (MAVEs), according to the firm. As part of the Phase II grant, Constantiam said it will expand Varify to include all MAVEs for cancer genes and benchmark its performance against clinically annotated variants.
In addition, the Houston-based company said it has developed a user-facing application, named MAVEvidence, for streamlined data presentation and evidence report generation to support the use of Varify. The company also plans to integrate functional analysis results generated by Varify into MAVEvidence to help automate the platform for scalability.
"The completion of the Phase II plan will get us closer to our mission to accelerate the development of life-saving precision diagnostics and therapeutics by providing innovative solutions that enhance the accuracy and efficiency of genetic testing and drug discovery," the company noted.