Firm makes world’s first early detection test for cancer

WHEN Associate Professor Too Heng-phon was about to start biotech firm Mirxes back in 2010, he asked several of his PHD students to join him, but also warned them that it would be tough.

Two of them decided to help set up the home-grown biotechnology firm, which went on to develop test kits that use blood-based micrornas (mirnas) to serve as biomarkers for early detection of cancers.

Dr Zhou Lihan is now the firm’s chief executive and Dr Zou Ruiyang is the chief technology officer.

The firm had little funding initially to manufacture the kits, which meant the top brass went without wages for a few months during tough times in 2015 to 2016, said Prof Too Heng-phon, who is with the Department of Biochemistry at the National University of Singapore’s Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine.

“We realised what we were doing helped to address unmet needs, which is the use of MIRNA in liquid biopsy to help find cancers at an early stage, something which was not heard of at that point,” Prof Too said in an interview with The Straits Times.

Liquid biopsy is a test done on a sample of blood to look for cancer cells from a tumour that is circulating in the blood. It can also detect pieces of genetic material or DNA from tumor cells.

The first mirnas were found in roundworms in 1993.

In 2000, scientific adviser Frank Slack from the Harvard Stem Cell Institute in the United States discovered the first known human MIRNA, which is a class of ribonucleic acids (RNAS) that play important roles in regulating gene expression.

These molecules help cells control the kinds and amounts of proteins they make, and are extremely small.

Given how new the technology was back in the early 2000s, some scientists were sceptical that the tiny molecules even existed.

Prof Too and his team managed to convince them. In 2002, the team demonstrated a proof-of-concept of their MIRNA detection technology at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine.

But he knew the best science experiments would still fail without sufficient money. Recalling the early days, Prof Too said the team had to work hard to ensure a sufficient, steady stream of funding.

“We did not have internal funding and if there were no grants, no research could be done. Nobody wanted to give us money, so by cobbling a bit of money here and there, we slowly did the work.”

It was only after knocking on many doors, and many rounds of rejections later, that Mirxes managed to receive some funding from the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*star) in 2010. The first test Mirxes developed used MIRNA as a biomarker to test for early-stage gastric cancer. The test kit, known as Gastroclear, was approved for use here by the Health Sciences Authority in 2019.

It was the world’s first molecular blood test for early detection of gastric cancer in high-risk populations.

The cancer is usually diagnosed through an endoscopy, a procedure perceived to be expensive and invasive as it involves inserting a thin tube with a camera into the patient’s mouth all the way to the stomach.

Mirxes hopes that with a simple blood test, more people can be screened for gastric cancer early and begin treatment at an early stage.