Celsius Therapeutics will apply its proprietary single-cell genomics platform to tissue samples from patients receiving immune checkpoint inhibitor therapies for triple-negative breast cancer, bladder cancer and kidney cancer, at cancer care providers in three countries.
The Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy in San Francisco, Institut Gustave Roussy in Paris, and the University Health Network in Toronto, have access to the single-cell genomics platform. The goal of the collaboration is to discover novel molecular mechanisms and targets for drug discovery.
“The heterogeneity of response in immunotherapy studies suggests that a deeper understanding of disease biology and patient subpopulations is needed to fully realize the potential of this approach,” Celsius CEO Tariq Kassum said in a statement.
Under these agreements, Celsius will apply its platform approach to generate single-cell data from patient biopsy samples taken pre- and post-treatment with checkpoint inhibitors. In each case, Celsius retains the ability to integrate the clinical information and single-cell genomics data generated from the studies into its growing database. The company plans to use its machine learning algorithms and functional genomics capabilities to rapidly identify and prioritize targets for drug discovery.
