AACR Annual Meeting 2021: AnchorDx Unveils High-Performance Blood Test for Gastric Cancer Screening

GUANGZHOU, China, April 19, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- At this year's American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting 2021 (April 10-15), molecular diagnostic company AnchorDx presented a poster (Poster 2610) unveiling its Aurora 2.0 study results. The poster introduced the company's upgraded one-tube methylation sequencing technology for gastric cancer (GC) screening.

According to the study, Aurora 2.0's overall performance (AUC) in GC screening is 97.4%, achieving an overall sensitivity of 86.7% and a stage I sensitivity of 87.5% at a pre-defined specificity of 99%. In addition to superior sensitivity and specificity features, Aurora 2.0 retains its original advantages such as low cost and short turnaround time. In China, the incidence and mortality of gastric cancer rank second (10.5%) and third (12.4%), respectively. The prevention and treatment of GC have been a major challenge due to a lack of effective screening methods. Thus, a blood-based Aurora gastric cancer screening renders significant clinical value.

Methodology

• 109 gastric cancer and 152 normal plasma samples were retrospectively collected from 5 clinical sites in China;
• A new strategy for marker selection and panel design was developed based on both public (e.g., TCGA) and in-house databases (genome-wide methylation profiling data derived from 2,000+ tissue and 4000+ plasma samples of cancer patients and normal controls);
• A K-fold cross-validation model was developed to provide an accurate assessment of generalized performance.

Results

• Overall performance (AUC) of the Aurora classifier is 97.4% for GC;
• Robust performance in gastric cancer screening - The sensitivity of each stage at the pre-defined specificity of 99% is shown in Table 2.

According to the company's current R&D results, the Aurora-based multi-cancer classifier has been proven to deliver high accuracy and efficiency in early cancer detection. A larger independent cohort comprised of four major cancers (Lung, breast, colorectal and gastric) and a finalized model of esophagus cancer are expected to be completed in the first half of 2021.

About AnchorDx

Founded in 2015, AnchorDx is a world-leading developer of cancer screening and early detection solutions based on methylation NGS technology. AnchorDx strives to revolutionize single/multi/pan-cancer early screening, detection technologies, and products. The current product pipeline encompasses more than 70% of high-incidence cancers. In addition, AnchorDx has a proprietary big data and artificial intelligence platform designed for early lung cancer screening, diagnosis, and treatment.