SV Bio, Mayo Clinic join forces

ROCHESTER, Minn.—Mayo Clinicand Silicon Valley Biosystems (SV Bio) have announced the establishment of astrategic collaboration for whole genome diagnostics and interpretation at twosites: the Mayo Clinic Center for Individualized Medicine and Mayo MedicalLaboratories.

"At Mayo Clinic, we arecommitted to integrating genomic medicine into the continuum of care for all ofour patients," Gianrico Farrugia, M.D., director of the Mayo Clinic Center forIndividualized Medicine, said in a press release. "The Individualized MedicineClinic represents one of Mayo's bold steps toward realizing the promise ofthese game-changing technologies and toward offering new hope to patients,including those with cancer and diagnostic dilemmas."

Per the agreement, SV Bio'sproprietary genome interpretation solution and Mayo Clinic's genome referencelibrary will be brought together in hopes of increasing accessibility to andclinical use of next-generation sequencing for patients. SV Bio will makeavailable its clinical genome interpretation services and clinical decisionsupport interfaces to Mayo Clinic, and the Center for Individualized Medicinewill provide clinical and laboratory support and expertise. No financialdetails were disclosed.

"Every human disease has agenetic component but, to date, medical providers have not been able to fullyutilize this information to improve clinical outcomes. With the SV Bioplatform, we've made the translation to a single assay — a full human genome —with the diagnostics rapidly and precisely happening in silico," Dietrich Stephan, Ph.D., founder, president and CEOof SV Bio, said in a statement.

SV Bio's process is fullycomputerized and automated, allowing for clinically actionable genome interpretationin a matter of minutes rather than weeks. While genome sequencing is gainingpopularity as the cost continues to drop, the volume of data that resultsremains an issue in terms of managing, interpreting and making use of it acrossthe board. SV Bio's technology evaluates a patient's genome at the point ofcare and distills it, providing physicians with concise, actionable reportsthat allow for more informed decisions, and the partners will seek to unlockthe potential of next-generation sequencing and make these technologiesavailable for all patients.

"In our laboratories, we arerapidly adopting and implementing next-generation sequencing as a platform uponwhich we will be providing cutting-edge genome-based testing," FranklinCockerill, M.D., president of Mayo Medical Laboratories, noted in a pressrelease. "This collaboration with SV Bio furthers our mission of bringing thelatest diagnostic technologies to health care providers around the world."

"We are now able to take datafrom any next-generation sequencer and determine with clinical-gradesensitivity and specificity which variants within a patient's DNA sequence areinfluencing a disease or condition, and rapidly provide a report for theclinician that is clear and actionable," said Stephan. "This level of speed,accuracy and integration into the clinical work flow is not only a first formolecular testing, but also a sea change in the application of next-generationsequencing with no compromise of quality in clinical diagnostics."

SOURCE: SV Bio press release