AptaQuest will enable more efficient drug discovery and earlier disease detection, using the power of single-molecule protein analysis.
Each protein comes in many varieties, yet current state-of-art technologies often cannot tell them apart. For proteins used as pharmaceuticals, this means that mixtures of effective and ineffective molecules are inadvertently overlooked, decreasing drug efficacy and safety. Similarly, the presence of some protein variants in a patient indicate the onset of disease, yet cannot be detected due to their likeness to uninformative variants. These issues are felt by 3000 academic groups, the 300B USD protein-based pharmaceutical industry and thousands of medical diagnosis professionals.
AptaQuest aims to solve the lack of resolution in proteomics by introducing a revolutionary new technology: protein variant analysis of individual molecules. Using a combination of single-molecule microscopy and fluorescent probes designed to attach to selected features, we see the variety that other methods average out, as well as extremely rare protein variants. Starting 2024, we will offer our technology as an analysis service, while developing several tiers of analysis devices for service providers and lab technicians.