ChromaTwist LTD, a spin out company from the University of Birmingham, has secured £300k of seed funding to develop a new class of fluorescent materials.
The materials will act as ‘signalling beacons’ by linking to antibodies that will detect a type of disease. This will be in use for diagnosing diseases such as cancer and diabetes and can be seen after emitting a colourful light from blue to red from changes. The funding will enable rapid development of products which will be ready to enter the cytometry market by the end of 2022.
Professor Jon Preece and Dr Alex Robinson led research groups leading them to the discovery of the fluorescent materials from the University’s School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering. The group began from a series of research into photo conducting liquid crystals, leading to a discovery of compounds with a unique chemistry.
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Over the next twelve months, the company will continue to test and develop the chemistry and biochemistry with expectations with its use in the flow cytometry market.
Professor Jon Preece commented: “There are no other materials out there that can do what we have discovered. What we are trying to do is develop our materials to break their monopoly and work in the real world. We have expanded our team of researchers and to ensure our intellectual property is compatible with existing flow cytometry equipment. Now we are in the development phase after having our first round of seed investment and are now seeking for partners who are willing to exploit our technology in their monopoly”.
The company’s founders are serial entrepreneurs who previously collaborated on an existing spinoff, Irresistible Materials LTD, which creates organic materials for innovative lithographic processes such as e-beam and EUV lithography. ChromaTwist has so far received commercial recognition, being nominated as a ‘one to watch’ in The Spinoff Prize 2020 organised by nature research.
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