ANG-007 (HNV Blood Collection Study)

• Research type

  Research Study

• Full title

  Development and optimisation of a microfluidic cell separation system for the isolation and evaluation of rare cells using healthy normal volunteer blood.

• IRAS ID

  253084

• Contact name

  Ian Griffiths

• Contact email

  i.griffiths@angleplc.com

• Sponsor organisation

  ANGLE plc

• Duration of Study in the UK

  6 years, 0 months, 7 days

• Research summary

  This research is building upon the work that has been conducted at ANGLE within the last three years, aiming at developing and further optimising an alternative method for cancer diagnosis. The current standard for cancer diagnosis is the pathological examination of a tissue biopsy specimen. This approach can be a complicated and intrusive procedure when tumours are located in difficult organ sites or when the primary tumours have been already removed and the metastatic tumours may be inaccessible.
  The Parsortix™ cell separation system developed by ANGLE represents a less invasive method to obtain essential, cancer related information from a simple blood sample. The Parsortix™ system isolates rare cells, such as circulating tumour cells (CTCs), which have shed from solid tumours and made their way into the bloodstream. The captured cells can be used in a wide range of standard techniques to identify, analyse and characterise the tumour.
  The current work at ANGLE has shown the development of several promising protocols for CTC capture and identification. The next steps and aim of this study are to further develop, test and optimise the Parsortix™ system and its accompanying protocols in order to improve CTC capture and characterisation, assess cancer type specificity, decrease undesirable background (e.g. white blood cells), and assess the usefulness of additional blood components (e.g. RNA, DNA) for diagnosis. In order to perform controlled experiments, we require the use of healthy blood samples what will be ‘spiked’ with a known number of representative cancer cells. The healthy blood samples will be effectively anonymised and the research team will not have access to any personal information of the donors. All personal data will be kept confidential and unlinked to the project. The blood, cells, DNA and RNA will only be used for the present study.

• REC name

  London - Surrey Borders Research Ethics Committee

• REC reference

  18/LO/1580

• Date of REC Opinion

  2 Oct 2018

• REC opinion

  Further Information Favourable Opinion