National Institutes of Health's National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK),US, has awarded $500,000 small business innovation research (SBIR) grant to Genalyte to develop multiplexed diagnostic assays for the early detection of Type 1 diabetes.
Under the SBIR-funded program, the company will initially create a basic multiplexed assay to detect autoimmune response for known targets for Type 1 diabetes.
Genalyte will then expand the approach to profile autoantibody response by multiple criteria to enhance the ability of researchers and clinicians to detect and monitor the development of the disease.
The company said upon completion of development of the autoantibody panels, they will be refined and validated using samples from patients with Type 1 diabetes.
Genalyte expects to collaborate with researchers from Dr. Eisenbarth's laboratory at the Barbara Davis Diabetes Center of the University of Colorado School of Medicine in Denver, US, for the validation phase.
The yet-to-be developed assay will run on the Genalyte's Maverick detection system, which uses a silicon chip containing arrays of photonic ring sensors to simultaneously analyze multiple autoantibodies and other proteins from a single small sample.
Genalyte chief scientific officer Martin Gleeson said, "The unique capabilities of our Maverick multiplexed detection platform have the potential to provide researchers and clinicians with the tools to detect and track this process from a very early stage, when therapeutic intervention to interrupt the process could be feasible."
