Quantum technology enabled blood diagnostics for safer and more patient centric cancer care & treatment management

癌症治疗的一个重要部分是确保每个患者都知道癌症的确切类型和进展。不幸的是，这是非常具有挑战性的，因为癌症是一种高度复杂的疾病，随着时间的推移而变化。肿瘤生长的方式非常复杂。医生经常不确定患者在服用某种药物后是否会好转。医生需要易于使用的工具，使他们能够知道患者癌症类型的确切“指纹”，以便他们能够更精确地选择哪种药物最适合特定患者。此外，制药公司正在开发先进的新药，可以更有效地治疗特定类型的癌症，但它们必须与特定患者的确切癌症类型特别匹配。因此，需要有更快速和方便的方法来了解患者的确切癌症类型。值得庆幸的是，科学家们已经发现，肿瘤释放出少量的“循环癌细胞”漂浮到患者的血液中。如果这些少量的细胞能够被识别和计数，我们将有能力通过简单的血液测试对患者进行“液体活检”。这一应用是由英国一家公司提出的，该公司开发了一种创新的诊断机器，能够通过自动计数患者血液中不同类型的细胞来分析血液。他们有机会与一家加拿大公司合作，该公司拥有非常特殊的“荧光材料”，可以使感兴趣的漂浮癌细胞变亮，更容易看到，更容易分析血液中的癌细胞。两家公司希望合作研究修改英国的诊断机器，使量子点附着在感兴趣的癌细胞上。该团队还希望包括一所拥有高灵敏度相机的加拿大大学，这将提高该团队计数和识别罕见漂浮癌细胞的能力。该团队正在寻求加拿大英国商业化量子技术计划的投资，以进行工程，生物化学，光学和基于软件的研究需要使团队能够证明该系统可以检测患者血液样本中的目标漂浮癌细胞。

A vital part of cancer therapy is to ensure the exact type and progression of the cancer is known for every patient. Unfortunately, this is very challenging, as cancer is a highly complex disease that changes over time. The way the tumours grow is incredibly complex. Doctors are frequently unsure if a patient will get better when given a particular drug.Doctors need easy to use tools that enable them to know the exact "fingerprint" of the patient's type of cancer so that they can more precisely select which drug will be best for a particular patient.Furthermore, drug companies are developing advanced new drugs that can treat specific types of cancer more effectively, but they must be specifically matched to the exact type of cancer for the specific patient. Consequently, there is a need to have more quick and convenient ways of understanding a patient's exact cancer type.Thankfully, scientists have discovered that tumours release small quantities of "circulating cancer cells" floating into the patients' blood. If these small numbers of cells can be identified and counted, we would have the ability to conduct "liquid biopsies" on patients with a simple blood test.This application is presented by a company in the UK developing an innovative diagnostic machine that is capable of analysing blood by automatically counting the different types of cells in a patient's blood. They have an opportunity to work with a Canadian company with very special "fluorescent materials" that will make it possible to make the floating cancer cells of interest light up and be more visible and easier to profile cancer cells in the blood.The two companies wish to work together on research to modify the diagnostic machine in the UK and make the quantum dots attach to the cancer cells of interest. The team also wants to include a Canadian university with a highly sensitive camera that will improve the team's ability to count and identify rare floating cancer cells.The enclosed team is seeking Canada UK Commercialising Quantum Technology Programme investment to conduct a programme of engineering, biochemical, optical and software-based research needed to enable the team to prove the system can detect the target floating cancer cells in patient's blood samples.