Epic Sciences will present an analysis of PD-L1 protein expression on circulating tumor cells (CTCs) from non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients. The poster presentation will take place November 19 at the 26th EORTC-NCI-AACR Symposium on Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics in Barcelona. Because tumor biopsy material is often limited in lung cancer patients, Epic developed a new assay that detects PD-L1 protein on CTCs in a blood sample. Novel immunotherapies targeting PD-L1, and its receptor PD-1, have demonstrated efficacy in clinical studies for a number of cancers. Consequently, a test to accurately quantify PD-L1 expression in a liquid biopsy may help identify patients more likely to respond to therapy.
“Accurately identifying and characterizing PD-L1 protein expression using Epic’s CTC technology could provide important insights into therapeutic response and disease progression to support the clinical development of new PD-1 and PD-L1 therapies,” said Murali Prahalad, Ph.D., president and CEO of Epic Sciences. “The benefit in Epic’s ‘no cell left behind’ technology is that we can develop very sensitive and specific biomarker tests that can also provide unique information about the cellular localization of biomarkers.”
“The PD-L1 test we developed on Epic’s CTC platform can not only identify PD-L1 protein levels in traditional CTCs, but also in epithelial plastic CTC subpopulations dramatically improving the sensitivity of the test,” said Ryan Dittamore, vice president, marketing and translational research of Epic Sciences. “Knowing which CTC subpopulations express PD-L1 is important for understanding potential mechanisms of resistance and further analysis of pharmacodynamics in the setting of PD-1 or PD-L1 therapy.”
Source: Epic Sciences
