Olink Proteomics announces the availability of the broadest and most complete protein biomarker panel for immuno-oncology

Olink Proteomics announces the availability of the broadest and most complete protein biomarker panel for immuno-oncology

Uppsala, Sweden, September 21, 2016 - Olink Proteomics today announced that Proseek^® Multiplex Immuno-Onc I,the broadest protein biomarker panel targeting critical biological process related to immunotherapy, is now available for immediate delivery. Developed to meet a clearly expressed need from customers, the panel is designed to help companies, scientists and clinicians working with immunotherapy-based approaches to treat cancer.

Immunotherapy is one of the most exciting and rapidly developing approaches to cancer therapy. Strategies that aim to strengthen the patient’s own immune system to fight tumor cells and to break tolerance in the tumor microenvironment are beginning to show great promise, with several successful clinical trials reported and some successes dealing with several types of tumors in patients with poor prognosis. Immunotherapy (often used in combinational therapy approaches) currently accounts for only about 3% of global cancer treatment, but this is widely expected to rise dramatically within the next decade. The global market for immuno-oncology has been estimated to be worth as much as $14 billion by 2019.

Non-invasive biomarkers for the immuno-oncology area offer great potential benefits in helping to better understand the underlying pathophysiology, study therapeutic efficacy and to stratify patients for clinical trials. The new panel will provide the immuno-oncology field with a tool that casts a relatively broad net (simultaneous analysis of 92 proteins), while enabling a targeted approach via the careful selection of relevant assays available. The biomarkers selected include proteins involved in key biological processes of high relevance for the immuno-oncology field, such as promotion and inhibition of tumor immunity, chemotaxis, vascular & tissue remodeling, apoptosis & cell killing and metabolism & autophagy.

Designed in close collaboration with experts in the field, the Immuno-oncology panel was first announced at the end of August, at the Immuno-Oncology Summit in Boston. Here, an early case study was presented from a collaboration with the Mt Sinai School of Medicine in. Details of the panel and further case study data from a collaboration with Uppsala University are also being presented at the Phacilitate Leaders Europe meeting on September 21-22 in Berlin.

“Olink is delighted to be able to offer this powerful precision proteomics solution to the immuno-oncology community. The opportunity to quickly analyze so many relevant proteins simultaneously will be of significant help in immunotherapy-based studies. Moreover, the ability of our technology to do this using only 1µL of sample and to provide robust analysis in almost any sample type will enable comparison of these proteins both remotely (e.g. serum) and within the tumor microenvironment (e.g. biopsy samples), which is a great advantage. Interest in this new panel has been significant and immediate, and we are excited to see how it will contribute to such an important and rapidly developing area for cancer therapy” says Andrea Villablanca, Product Manager at Olink Proteomics.

What the scientists say

“The new Immuno-Oncology panel is uniquely compiled with cytokines, chemokines, growth factors and cell surface molecules that play key roles in immunotherapeutic treatments. The miniaturization of the assay using only 1 µL of the sample is also a significant advantage for clinical studies that have limiting amounts of biospecimens” says Seunghee Kim-Schulze, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Hess Center for Science and Medicine, Human Immune Monitoring Core Facility (HIMC), Mount Sinai School of Medicine, NY.

“Olink’s Immuno-Oncology panel is the first available platform to shed light on the complexity of tumor immunity. Using Proseek, I have been able to understand the mechansims of action of both effect and treatment failure which now support the design of upcoming trials. This will make a difference for the patients!” says Angelica Loskog, PhD, Professor of Immunotherapy (adj) Uppsala University, CEO Lokon Pharma AB.

Product and technology information
Proseek Multiplex Immuno-Onc I offers high-throughput multiplex immunoassays that measure 92 proteins across 96 samples simultaneously using only one microliter of serum, plasma, tumor cell lysate, or almost any other type of biological sample. Thousands of samples per week can be analyzed using this panel, which greatly accelerates the speed of protein biomarker discovery.

Proseek Multiplex is based on the proprietary Proximity Extension Assay (PEA) technology developed by Olink. PEA is a homogeneous assay that uses pairs of antibodies equipped with DNA reporter molecules which upon target binding give rise to new DNA amplicons, each ID-barcoding their respective antigens. Cross-reactive events are not detected since the sequence design allows only the correctly matched antibody pairs to give rise to a signal. The amplicons are subsequently quantified by high throughput real-time PCR. This dual recognition, DNA-coupled method provides exceptional readout specificity and enables Proseek Multiplex to achieve a combination of high multiplexing level and data quality that cannot be matched using standard immunoassay techniques. An animation overviewing how the technology works and what it is used for can be viewed on Olink’s YouTube channel.

For research use only. Not for use in diagnostic procedures.

About Olink Proteomics

Through our dedication to innovation, quality, rigor and transparency, Swedish company Olink Proteomics’ groundbreaking solutions help scientists make research decisions more quickly and confidently through robust, multiplex biomarker analysis. Our Proseek® Multiplex immunoassay panels enable rapid, high-throughput analysis with exceptional data quality and minimal consumption of precious biological samples. Only 1 µL of sample is needed to address 92 biomarkers simultaneously and each panel is sufficient for 96 samples, generating more than 9 000 data points from each run. Each Proseek Multiplex panel is focused on a specific area of disease or biology, targeting 92 established and/or exploratory biomarkers that have been carefully selected in collaboration with leading experts in the field. All assays are rigorously quality controlled and our validation data is made freely available. Customers can obtain Proseek Multiplex as ready-to-use kits to run the assays themselves, or can choose to let our in-house experts run their samples for them, using our Proseek Multiplex Analysis Service in Uppsala, Sweden or Boston MA.

Olink Proteomics is headquartered in Uppsala, Sweden and also recently opened an office and service laboratory for the U.S. organization in Boston.

For more information, please visit www.olink.com.

Proseek is a registered trademark of Olink Proteomics AB.

Contact information
Andrea Villablanca, PhD
Product Manager
Phone: +46-18-444 3970
E-mail: info@olink.com