Two companies with STEM street cred are collaborating to help detect and treat sudden life-threatening conditions.
A press release today notes Ontera and QuantuMDx are working on technology to identify infections in the bloodstream, as well as drug-resistant bacterial infections in patients.
“As sepsis can become life threatening in a very short period of time, clinicians need to act fast,” said Ontera CEO Murielle Thinard-McLane in a press statement to Healio, which has reported on the progress and its potential. “Together, the QuantuMDx and Ontera platform aims to deliver comprehensive test results in less than 30 minutes at the point of care.”
The partners have experience in developing medical technologies – the Ontera company, formally Two Pore Guys, has been innovating in nanotechnology and QuantuMDx is an established multinational life sciences company with global operations including 90 business locations and a history of working with national health agencies. The company also has 7 provisional patents filed for various innovations related to medical applications.
The new project has potential to save lives – it shortens the feedback loop from a 24-hour culture lab test to evaluation and diagnosis within a much shorter time, characterized by leaders as “minutes,” where technology looks for bacterial counts.
“Our early prototype testing has already shown sensitivity in the range required for this kind of test and performed in minutes from spiked bacteria in whole blood. We haven’t even pushed the technology yet, but it has the potential to become a paradigm-shifting, powerful device,” QuantuMDx Chief Scientific Officer Jonathan O’Halloran, PhD, said in a press statement.
When these types of advances come together to fight quick-acting threats to human life, we can celebrate some of the more humane and necessary aspects of AI and smart science. Look for more on this and other life-saving applications in modern medicine.
