Description du projet
Un test diagnostic novateur pour le lupus
Le lupus est une maladie auto-immune qui touche des millions de personnes dans le monde. Le diagnostic est souvent retardé car il n’existe aucun outil diagnostique spécifique et que la plupart des symptômes s’apparentent à ceux d’autres maladies auto-immunes. Pour répondre à ce défi, le projet ClarifyLupus, financé par l’UE, a développé un outil innovant pour le diagnostic du lupus. Contrairement aux anticorps qui manquent cruellement de spécificité parmi les maladies associées au lupus, l’initiative ClarifyLupus emploie un biomarqueur spécifique au lupus dont l’efficacité a été validée dans des échantillons sanguins. Cet outil diagnostique révolutionnaire est susceptible de faciliter le dépistage précoce, contribuant ainsi à prévenir les dommages irréversibles de cette maladie dévastatrice.
Objectif
The difficulty on diagnosing lupus is due not only to the occurrence of overlapping symptoms with other autoimmune diseases but also to the unavailability of a lab test to confirm or rule out Lupus.
The autoimmune disease is devastating, and the later it is diagnosed, the worse are the irreversible damages to the patients. In the USA alone, there are 13.8M people with Lupus and overlapping diseases and 2,6M new cases of these diseases are diagnosed each year. These diseases affect more than 25M people in the EU.
We have developed a technology capable of identifying and quantifying altered proteins that play a key role in the onset of Lupus. Our product ClarifyLupus is a diagnostic test that is effective since the early stages of the disease.
Although our competitors are conducting research on Lupus biomarker discovery, they all are focused in autoantibodies biomarker discovery that are highly unspecific among Lupus-confounding diseases. In contrast we have a Lupus-specific biomarker that enables the Lupus diagnosis much earlier than our competitors.
We have passed the proof-of-concept stage where our diagnosis methodology was tested in blood samples and in January 2018 we have secured the Portuguese ethical committee approval to perform clinical assays, and are recruiting 50 patients until the end of the year.
In April 2018 we secured a Letter of Support from the Egas Moniz Hospital in Lisbon, stating the importance and market disruption of ClarifyLupus.
Clarify Analytical was founded in 2017 by Alexandra Antunes and João Rodrigues, two expert technologists in the fields of toxicology and mass spectroscopy, supported by 3 team members. The start-up was selected for the prestigious CoHiTech acceleration program in Portugal, focused on business and technology go-to-market. ClarifyLupus will be the breakthrough for Lupus diagnosis which will allow Lupus patients to be treated earlier, extending their lives by decades and improving their quality.
Champ scientifique
Programme(s)
Régime de financement
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinateur
7000-872 EVORA
Portugal
L’entreprise s’est définie comme une PME (petite et moyenne entreprise) au moment de la signature de la convention de subvention.