NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – HTG Molecular Diagnostics said today that it has signed separate research and service agreements with pharma firm Daiichi Sankyo and French research institute Centre Léon Bérard.
Under the first agreement, HTG will perform work for Daiichi Sankyo in HTG's VERI/O laboratory. The initial project includes the development of a custom assay to detect nearly 3,000 mRNA targets using the HTG EdgeSeq technology.
When completed, the assay will be used to generate data from formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded samples. Daiichi Sankyo plans to use these data to identify a tumor profiling assay for future studies under the agreement. Daiichi Sankyo also has engaged HTG to process several hundred FFPE samples using the HTG EdgeSeq ALKPlus Assay EU in a research-use-only mode for exploratory research on new, potential therapeutic biomarkers.
As part of the second agreement, HTG work with Centre Léon Bérard to use the HTG EdgeSeq Oncology Biomarker Panel to retrospectively characterize immunologic profiles from advanced malignant tumor samples collected in the ProfiLER study. ProfiLER is a non-randomized, multi-center cohort study that aims to establish the genetic and immunologic profile of tumors for patients with advanced malignant tumors in order to define a map of genetic and immunologic profiles for all the studied types of cancer.
The work at Centre Léon Bérard, led by Pierre Saintigny in the Department of Translational Research and Innovation, "will allow us to identify biomarkers with a potential predictive value and to determine if some genetic disorders are linked to immunity status alterations," Jean-Yves Blay, director of Centre Léon Bérard, said in a statement.
Financial terms of the agreements were not disclosed.
The HTG EdgeSeq chemistry is a sample and library preparation method that uses a combination of proprietary hybridization probe technology, PCR, and molecular tagging for sequencing-based quantitative assays. The HTG EdgeSeq system automates the company's assays built on this chemistry.