An San Francisco Bay Area Longevity Entrepreneur working on a new product:
Hello all,
I’m leading a group that is developing a new biomarker measurement device. There is a relatively recent innovation in the area of protein quantification called “digital ELISA.” It is similar to a sandwich ELISA except that you run an individual detection reaction around every single molecule of analyte and then count molecules. It enables unprecedented accuracy, 2-3 orders of magnitude better than conventional analog methods. There are several approaches that have been demonstrated, reviewed here:
It is the foundational technology behind a company called Quanterix, but their particular approach to digital ELISA is extremely expensive and not amenable to widespread dissemination of the technology. We’re adapting the concept of digital ELISA to a much simpler process that should allow us to target point of care including urgent care clinics, physician’s offices, longevity clinics, battlefield health, and home wellness markets. The technology is well suited to low-cost, single sample quantification of low abundance proteins from very small quantities of blood, and allows for multiplexing of several targets from a single sample. Whereas Quanterix has focused on extremely rare proteins, our goal is to use digital ELISA to open the door to inexpensive testing with rapid feedback without the need for the intervention of a phlebotomist. Coming from the glucose monitoring industry, I see it enabling at-home protein quantification the same way that blood glucose meters enabled self-testing of blood glucose.
My question for the group is: what biomarkers should we pursue? What is your personal interest, and where do you see the greatest market need?
Our device should work for targets for which there are antibodies or aptamers - most targets that you can quantify by conventional ELISA.
Ideal targets are things that you might measure frequently, either daily or several times per day for short periods, as people do with glucose.
Proteins that require rapid processing are of interest, as well as those that can’t survive dried blood spot processing.
I look forward to your feedback!
Robert
Robert Cargill <rcargillpdx@gmail.com