In the next two years of the project, we will focus on expanding our current proprietary database with 1,500 new samples collected by our cohort of dental clinics involved in the PreBiomicsPMT study. Newly sequenced microbiome data will be integrated and harmonized with previous data. The DSS will be trained on this extended microbiome database, baseline clinical information, treatment details (as independently chosen by the dentist), and the clinical outcomes of such treatment. Once the DSS is fully functional, we will start its validation on an additional 1,500 newly collected microbiome samples from both peri-implantitis and mucositis patients. The validation of the DSS will focus on proving its predictive power in real-life settings.
Moreover, we will further validate the antibiotic resistance detection software by exploiting synthetic metagenomes. We will bioinformatically build metagenomes starting from genomes of known bacteria usually found in the plaque microbiome, and we will add a test bacterial species genome carrying known resistance genes at decreasing relative abundance to test the limit of detection of our method. This will help us optimize the sequencing depth for our plaque microbiome samples to account for the software limitations and offer the best value-for-money test to clients.
We will test product interest in our reference markets by conducting independent surveys for dental professionals and patients and further collaborating with our partner Geistlich, which is already well-established in all three countries. We will expand collaboration with IPR consultants to ensure the best protection for our innovative products, and with regulatory consultants to ensure adherence to ethical, legal, and administrative guidelines and rules.