LungLife to participate in the US National Cancer Institute’s Early Detection Research Network

LungLife AI, Inc.
(the “Company” or “LungLife”)

 LungLife to participate in the US National Cancer Institute’s Early Detection Research Network

 LungLife AI (AIM: LLAI), a developer of clinical diagnostic solutions for lung cancer, announces that based on the strength of its technology it will be one of two industry partners to participate in the Boston University (“BU”) -University of California Los Angeles (“UCLA”) Lung Cancer Biomarker Development Laboratory of the US National Cancer Institute’s Early Detection Research Network (“EDRN”).

The EDRN is a division of the US National Cancer Institute, the federal government’s principal agency for cancer research and training. The EDRN’s mission is to discover, develop, and validate new biomarkers and medical imaging technologies to detect early-stage cancers, and to translate them into clinical tests. It is comprised of over 300 investigators from academic institutions and industry partners working collaboratively to bring new diagnostic biomarkers to clinical use.

LungLife’s clinical laboratory will operate as a Biomarker Reference Laboratory, processing blood samples from the participating academic centres at UCLA and BU where the LungLB® test will be combined with imaging to assist their early detection research, as well as validate combined test performance in patients with indeterminate lung nodules. It is expected the blood samples will be collected over a number of years with progress and results presented to EDRN members at annual meetings, representing the first independent study of LungLB®. These activities are independent of LungLife’s ongoing pivotal validation study and do not impact on the progress of this study.

The work of the EDRN closely aligns with LungLife’s mission to increase the early detection of lung cancer and will provide further clinical evidence for the LungLB® technology as well as widen awareness of our technology with leading US investigators. It also affords LungLife the potential to offer novel cell-based diagnostic biomarkers discovered at UCLA and BU to physicians from its clinical laboratory, thereby potentially expanding its lung cancer testing capabilities.

Paul Pagano, CEO for LungLife said: “We are excited that LungLife will participate in such a prestigious national programme aimed at bringing early detection technology to the clinic, and we are delighted to work with UCLA and BU, two leading medical research institutions with teams that have been pushing the field forward to make important biomarkers available to patients.”

 Denise Aberle, MD, Professor of Radiology and Bioengineering, Vice Chair for Research, Department of Radiological Sciences at UCLA, EDRN Investigator said: “Lung cancer remains the deadliest cancer because most people are diagnosed in later stages after developing symptoms – the ability to detect lung cancer in early stages could have a profound effect on patients’ outcomes. Cell-based biomarkers have considerable potential for early cancer detection. When combined with imaging markers using artificial intelligence/radiomics analysis of computed tomography, combined imaging and cell-based approaches could substantially shift the diagnosis of lung cancer to early stages when it is most curable. 

 “We look forward to collaborating on this grant to evaluate novel imaging and cell-based biomarkers in patients with intermediate-risk indeterminate lung nodules, which are the most diagnostically challenging nodules to evaluate and represent a critical unmet need in early lung cancer detection.”

BU’s press release can be found at: https://www.bumc.bu.edu/busm/news-events/

For the full announcement click HERE.