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Diagnostics World News | A “quiet revolution” has been underway over the past year, exponentially growing the number of genetic variants discoverable by genome sequencing, according to Stephen Kingsmore, M.D., president and CEO of Rady Children's Institute for Genomic Medicine in San Diego. Notably, it is now possible to identify an enormous number of structural variants—large genomic alterations that include insertions, deletions, and copy number variations—which account for about 20% of diagnoses in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).
Oct 28, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | There are several challenges within the existing diagnostics and prognostics landscape. The first is the use of subjective, qualitative measurements. This can lead to a wide range of variability in clinical assessments. Trying to better standardize assessments across clinical sites and laboratories is a major area for improvement.
Oct 26, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | Most rare diseases have a genetic component, yet most people with rare diseases remain undiagnosed, Thomas Defay, Alexion Pharmaceuticals, told the audience at the Bio-IT World Conference & Expo last month. Alexion has partnered with Genomenon to build out curated dashboards specific to some of Alexion’s genetic diseases of interest.
Oct 21, 2021
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Diagnostics World | Several research groups and start-ups are pursuing the potential of scratch-and-sniff testing, envisioning it as a simple, cheap, and accessible tool that could help limit transmission and avoid shutdowns during the next phase of the coronavirus pandemic.
Oct 19, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | No one awaiting the results of a biopsy wants to hear that they may be in for a longer wait. But, there’s a good chance results may be delayed and there is an understandable reason for it: There are tens of millions of biopsies ordered each year, and there aren’t enough histotechnologists to process them.
Oct 15, 2021
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Bio-IT World | Researchers at Washington University (WashU) are exploring use of cell-free DNA (cfDNA) as a liquid biopsy analyte for solid tumors and, most recently, to track and predict organ damage causes by sepsis. Particularly noteworthy is their liquid biopsy for distinguishing between benign and malignant tumors in a heritable cancer predisposition syndrome.
Oct 13, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | Several investments to improve the COVID-19 testing supply chain, funding acquisitions for image data analysis, personalized medicine plans, seed round for medical genetics software, and more.
Oct 11, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | New assays for COVID-19 detection and partnerships to increase testing; AI detection tools for prostate cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, rare diseases; and diagnostic partnerships with AstraZeneca, Mount Sinai, and Merck. Plus new products from Proscia, Seegene, Thermo Fisher, Sensyne Health, and more.
Oct 7, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has fast-tracked tests under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) during the coronavirus pandemic. Along the way, there has been a flurry of activity in a short time. But what will happen to the many COVID-19 tests that have been issued EUAs once the public health emergency winds down? Diagnostics World gathered insight from the FDA and several companies to learn more about the road ahead.
Oct 6, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | Accurate diagnosis and monitoring of neurodegenerative diseases are complicated by a patient’s delayed clinical symptoms, which often appear decades after molecular disease onset. Biomarkers that detect the molecular changes preceding the clinical symptoms of neurodegenerative disease are critical for clinical trials at pre-symptomatic stages, effective diagnostics and the subsequent development of preventive therapies.
Oct 1, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | Researchers at the University of British Columbia (UBC) are developing microwave sensing devices that communicate with molecules to detect the presence of bacteria, as well as their growth pace and response to antibiotics—and deliver the information in about six hours.
Sep 29, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and South Korean biotech Medical & Bio Decision Company Ltd. (MBD) are working on turning a biochip into a personalized immunotherapy platform for rapidly screening a wide range of treatment cocktails for individual cancer patients. The platform would be ideally suited for very small tumor biopsy samples.
Sep 27, 2021
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Diagnostics World News | Vaccine resistance has joined antibiotic overuse on the list of issues threatening public health, researchers say, adding fears that the current pushback on vaccination against COVID will spread to other preventable diseases such as measles, mumps, and rubella.
Sep 22, 2021
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Diagnostics World News Infectious disease diagnosis has been shifting from culture-based methods and immunoassays to molecular diagnostic testing, and more of the work is happening at the point of care (POC) rather than a centralized lab.
Sep 20, 2021