NEW YORK – City University of Hong Kong (CityUHK) said Monday that it is partnering with Cellomics to design a circulating tumor cell (CTC) screening assay that they intend to commercialize within the next two years.
The novel platform will combine an automated CTC sorting instrument, a cell staining device and imaging system, and reagent kits for CTC protein and genetic profiling to count and classify CTCs. The goal is to detect genes and proteins for early cancer screening, diagnosis, drug selection, efficacy measurements, and prognosis.
The project, called "Microfluidics-Based Detection Platform for Circulating Tumor Cells and Its Applications in Cancer Early Screening and Disease Monitoring," is funded by a government program called the RAISe+ (Research, Academic, and Industry Sectors One-plus) Scheme, which launched in 2023 with HK$10 billion (US$1.29 billion).
RAISe+ provides funding for the transformation and commercialization of R&D projects from local universities on a matching basis, up to HK$100 million per project.
The amount of funding provided for the CityUHK/Cellomics collaboration was not immediately available.
The project is led by Michael Mengsu Yang, a professor of biomedical sciences at CityUHK and a cofounder of Cellomics, which is also based in Hong Kong.
"Precision diagnosis and comprehensive analysis of CTCs through multiomics technologies are crucial for cancer early screening, disease monitoring, as well as the development of cell therapies and mRNA vaccines for specific targets and antigens, further supporting the personalized cancer treatment," Yang said in a statement.