Post by Queen Mary Innovation

Congratulations to Professor Tatjana Crnogorac-Jurcevic on launching a new Queen Mary spinout company, Procyon Diagnostics. The spinout is built on fifteen years of research and innovation at Barts Cancer Institute (Queen Mary University of London). We spoke with Professor Tatjana Crnogorac-Jurcevic about the impact Procyon could have: “We launched Procyon to take omics-based single cancer early detection tests from research to reality. Cancer causes over a quarter of deaths in England, and early detection offers the best hope of survival.” “Our first product, the PancRISK test for pancreatic cancer, is a prime example. Pancreatic cancer is extremely difficult to spot, which means for most patients it’s already too late.” “Through our research at Queen Mary, we’ve developed a blood and urine test that uses machine learning to accurately spot pancreatic cancer in a resectable stage. In doing so, we can significantly change the odds of survival, potentially saving thousands of lives each year.” “The test is currently being validated through a PCRF funded, multi-centre clinical trial UroPanc, and we’ll be launching it early next year. It will be the world’s first available pancreatic cancer test of this kind suitable for regular checkups.” “Procyon is an impact-driven spinout which combines world-class academic research with commercial leadership and investor backing from the start. We aim to become a leading provider of biomarker technologies for early cancer detection, which we hope will bring immense benefits to patients and their families.” Procyon’s leadership includes Tony Cooke, Chief Executive; Tatjana Crnogorac-Jurcevic, Chief Scientific Officer; Clive Minihan, Non-Executive Chair; and Andrew Halliday, Non-Executive Director Technology. Discover the science behind PancRISK in this video recorded earlier in the research.

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