biomarker – UF Innovate https://innovate.research.ufl.edu Building business on innovation Tue, 12 Aug 2025 04:18:23 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 https://innovate.research.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/favicon-blue_1.png biomarker – UF Innovate https://innovate.research.ufl.edu 32 32 DiaCarta Q&A: Liquid Biopsy for Early Cancer Detection https://innovate.research.ufl.edu/diacarta-liquid-biopsy/ Tue, 20 Jul 2021 00:00:00 +0000 https://scaddev1.com/diacarta-liquid-biopsy/ When a patient develops cancer, two different cancer-derived materials can be found in their blood: intact circulating tumour cells (CTCs) and cell-free circulating tumour DNA (cfDNA), which is released into the bloodstream as tumours grow. Clinicians can use blood drawn from a patient’s arm to search for CTCs and cfDNA that may be circulating in their bloodstream using a liquid biopsy.

Many liquid biopsy technologies are based on polymerase chain reaction (PCR), a technology that amplifies the information present within molecules and makes it easier to detect any mutations in known cancer-related genes.

Sometimes these cancerous changes can be very small, and clinicians will need to rely on deep sequencing – where a genomic region is sequenced hundreds, or even thousands, of times.

UF Innovate | Sid Martin Biotech alum DiaCarta Inc., a precision molecular diagnostics company, announced that its cfDNA biomarker algorithm was able to function as a prognostic biomarker and efficacy predictor for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients. The algorithm was able to provide real-time evaluation of the therapy and allowed clinicians to adjust the treatment at earlier stages.

DiaCarta is now initiating a large-scale clinical development program, which will monitor cfDNA levels to determine early treatment outcomes of systemic therapy in all types of stage IV cancer.

Learn more about DiaCarta Q&A: Liquid Biopsy for Early Cancer Detection.
Sid Martin Biotech Alum DiaCarta’s Biomarker Algorithm Predicts Response and Outcome of Chemotherapy
DiaCarta’s Novel XNA Technology Rapidly Detects Raging New SARS-CoV-2 Variants
DiaCarta Gets FDA Emergency Use Authorization for Coronavirus PCR Test
]]>