SomaLogic, Children’s Hospital team up against childhood diseases

BOULDER —SomaLogic Inc. of Boulder and Aurora-based Children’s Hospital Colorado said on Wednesday they will collaborate to develop laboratory tests to improve the diagnosis and management of childhood diseases.

Financial details of the agreement were not disclosed.

The discovery and development work will be done using SomaLogic’s SOMAscan assay, which can measure more than a thousand proteins in a small amount of blood or other biological samples.

Researchers at Children’s Hospital Colorado and SomaLogic will analyze the proteins from blood samples obtained from children suffering from disease. They will select those proteins, or biomarkers, whose change in concentration is correlated with disease to serve as a basis for developing in-house diagnostic tests for future clinical use. The research team will be led by Dr. Robin Deterding.

The tests will rely on SomaLogic’s technology, which can be scaled to measure from thousands of proteins for discovery of biomarkers to only a few selected proteins for diagnostic purposes.

“This collaboration with Children’s Hospital and CU School of Medicine faculty is the ideal model for how we would like to see our technology used by academic research centers to make a difference in the lives of patients,” Byron Hewett, chief executive off SomaLogic, said in a statement. “Their clinical insight and expertise matched to our proteomics expertise should lead to both a deeper understanding of the biology of these devastating diseases, and to new ways to manage them more precisely and effectively.”

“We are excited about the possibilities this partnership will develop for earlier identification and improved management of childhood diseases,” said Jim Shmerling, CEO of Children’s Hospital Colorado. “SomaLogic’s innovative technology coupled with our clinical expertise will allow us to diagnose and ultimately improve treatment for children everywhere.”

Children’s Hospital Colorado is a nonprofit hospital for children located on the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora.

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