OncoMRD (Monitoring Residual Disease) is not just a new technology for monitoring residual disease in solid tumors. It would be a fundamental rethink of the modern cancer battlefield and what those scenario’s threats are. It represents a broader reaction at OncoDxRx to current and future theranostics developments.

OncoMRD strives to address the limitations of the current tumor-informed NGS-based MRD tests by prioritizing situational awareness via integrating hyperactive biomarkers and leveraging gene signatures to analyze broader and deeper signals of “tumor activity” beyond tumor genomics. OncoMRD’s gene expression profiling could help clinicians find and identify cancer threats earlier and take steps to address those threats quicker than current generation MRD assays.

Precision and personalized medicine has shaped OncoMRD design by targeting overactive tumor activities, immune cell responses, and integration with multi-domain biomarkers. While other MRD tests are by no means obsolete, OncoMRD is developed to address the tumor-specific, mutation-only limitations by interrogating both tumor and non-tumor functionality signals. Better situational awareness and leveraging of activity-based monitoring systems are key advantages that could better counter the threat of residual disease.

OncoDxRx developed the advanced and modular next-generation OncoMRD with room to adapt to future cancer threats.

“What we are doing is to invent the new MRD system with the same purpose. However, the employment of the OncoMRD is easier because we do not need expensive NGS systems and we do not need complicated bioinformatics to support it. We just need a regular testing platform that every lab has it…. That’s the main difference.”

Tumor-informed DNA-based MRD assays are already in service in a few labs. However, said OncoDxRx, the current sequencing process – which is time-consuming and labor-intensive, and based around multiple instrumentation thus more opportunities for errors – presents restrictions and is not easy to use.

In the clinical context, OncoDxRx’s OncoMRD technology adds clear advantage. “It allows the test to expand the detection range from tumor DNA sequences to tumor activities, i.e., the identification of hyperactive gene signature,” said OncoDxRx. “So far, the only sensitive means to identify residual tumors is with somatic mutations.”

In sum, the company said, OncoMRD is to identify “de-regulated” overactive gene activities from both tumor and non-tumor microenvironment, far beyond tumor genomics.