bioAffinity Technologies, Inc. and Pictor, Inc. have entered into a collaboration to support development and commercialization of bioAffinity Technologies’ next-generation diagnostic tests designed to provide a more complete picture of lung inflammation in patients with asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

The agreement will integrate bioAffinity’s expertise in flow cytometry with Pictor’s targeted proteomic analysis platform to analyze immune cell populations and cytokine profiles associated with airway inflammation.

bioAffinity has multiple patents pending for its inventions related to its asthma and COPD testing platform and will own the intellectual property associated with the tests that may emanate from the collaboration. Pictor retains its existing intellectual property and will own new inventions related to its targeted proteomic platform technology.

The tests under development build on bioAffinity's proprietary approach to interrogating the lung microenvironment through sputum analysis, the same scientific platform that powers CyPath Lung, the Company's commercially available noninvasive test that helps physicians assess the likelihood that a pulmonary nodule is malignant. The Company anticipates that the tests under development will initially be offered as Laboratory Developed Tests (LDTs) under the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA).

bioAffinity Technologies’ flow cytometry platform differentiates and quantifies immune cell populations in sputum while Pictor’s proteomic platform rapidly analyzes the inflammatory proteins, or cytokines, produced by those immune cells. The anticipated result is a high-throughput laboratory test for bioAffinity Technologies that is intended to help physicians identify the inflammatory pathways driving an individual patient’s disease and support more informed decisions when considering advanced therapies, including FDA-approved biologics and emerging targeted treatments.

Read the full announcement for more information