Applications
For more application information, click to view the Case Studies page.
The company’s flagship product is a patent-protected, photonic system that non-destructively discriminates between benign and malignant tissue, with applications in cancer detection as well as other disease states. This unique product will enable improved diagnosis, better treatment and ultimately cost reduction in the health care system.
Applications areas currently under study include: accelerating feedback in drug discovery; breast tumor margin assessment; breast biopsy; cervical cancer detection; and head and neck cancer.
The research team has already carried out a number of clinical studies (click to view Case Studies page) in various high-value application areas:
- Breast biopsy diagnosis
- Cervical cancer diagnosis
- Breast cancer margin assessment
- Monitoring response to therapy
- Drug discovery and pharmaceutical testing
Zenalux Technology in Pre-clinical and Clinical Applications
Zenalux technology has been applied to the quantitative optical analysis of tissues in a number of published studies in both pre-clinical models and in patients. In the breast, the Zenalux technology has been proven to be sensitive to sources of intrinsic optical contrast, in particular, hemoglobin, beta carotene and scattering which effectively discriminate diseased from healthy tissues (see Published Papers.)
Published studies have also examined tumor oxygen saturation within the tumor microenvironment in vivo in the breast (see Brown et al.).
A variety of implementation modes have been demonstrated: from ex vivo analysis of biopsy specimens after removal from the breast, to in vivo tissue analysis conducted through the lumens of biopsy needles and cannulas.
The Zenalux technology has been demonstrated as a useful tool for measuring physiological endpoints pertinent to tumor response to therapy. In a study published by Vishwanath et al oxygen saturation measured from a murine model of head and neck cancer was able to predict partial response vs. local control in animals treated with a single dose of radiation as early as 7 days after treatment initiation. In another study published by Palmer et al., the baseline oxygen saturation was inversely related to tumor growth rate after treatment with low temperature liposomal Doxirubicin. A highly significant correlation was demonstrated between pre-treatment oxygen saturation and tumor growth delay (r=0.8).