Atlas Biomed offers two types of tests, DNA testing and microbiota testing Both can determine a person’s chance of developing a certain disease, which can be used for providing recommendations on minimizing health risks. Currently, the company’s office is the largest storage of biomaterial in Great Britain and is preparing for another fundraising round, according to co-founder and Medical Director Andrei Perfilyev who spoke to Invest Foresight at the VestiFinance forum.
Number one in Britain
Atlas Biomed was founded five years ago. Just over two years ago, it entered the international market.
“Our company is the largest depository of British stool (biomaterial),” Andrei Perfilyev laughs.
The storage contains over 5,000 samples. The company’s head office is also based in the UK while the Russian office is a subsidiary. The company was authorized to sell tests by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). In Russia the tests are not considered a medical service. The group was founded by bioinformatics expert Sergei Musiyenko and Andrei Perfilyev, endocrinologist and former founder and co-owner of the Doctor At Work social network for medical professionals. Over the five years, Atlas has managed to raise $8 mio and sign preliminary agreements on more investment with several foundations.
The genomic technology market is growing. In the past 20 years, the price of a full genomic analysis has gone down from $3 bln (2001) to $1,000. Atlas Biomed’s main competitor in genetic testing in England is 23andMe founded by Anne Wojcicki, ex-wife of Google co-founder Sergey Brin. In Russia it is Genotek. As concerns microbiota testing, Atlas is the largest market player in Russia and Europe.
DNA and microbiota testing
Genome is a script of a human organism that can tell us about a person’s possible health conditions in the next few years, especially when it comes to hereditary diseases. More than 20,000 pieces of scientific research are used to interpret test results. Atlas’s new innovative project is molecular cancer diagnostics that can help to determine what medication would be efficient for this particular patient.
Atlas Biomed also conducts gut microbiome testing to predict the risk of five types of diseases, including bowel diseases, type 2 diabetes, ischemic heart disease, Parkinson’s disease, and obesity. The test is based on the method of sequencing fecal bacteria DNA. Microbiota is a community of bacteria, viruses and fungi that live in a human body; most of them are found in the digestive tract. There are some 40 tln bacteria, which is more than the number of our human cells.
Testing and AI
During the test, a patient puts the biomaterial sample into a special box that handles it properly due to a special composition. The box contains a test tube, a toilet seat cover, a small shovel, the Bristol stool scale, and a manual. The special cover allows avoiding the sample’s contact with the toilet seat, making the analysis more accurate.
In England, biomaterial can be transported by mail to a laboratory, where DNA is extracted from the sample. The data is then compared with a vast amount of other data from scientific articles through the use of a neural network. The company has its own sets of data and the access to such sets from other large biobanks. The neural network is trained to compare a patient’s microbiota with that of a person with a certain disease and to assess the difference in profiles. In case microbiota profiles are vastly different from each other, the risk of a disease is apparently low; in case of a similarity, the patient should pay attention to his health and intestinal bacteria. Atlas has marked nearly 30,000 of such data sets, with a team of data scientists working in the company.
The testing provides patients with an accurate picture of their gut microbiota bacteria and a list of possible diseases. The intestinal bacteria structure allows determining how efficiently the microbiota digests fiber, synthesizes butyric acid and produces vitamins, and the way it is different or similar with microbiota of people who suffer from certain diseases.
“Our test is not aimed at exposing pathogens; it is used for generally healthy people who would like to learn more about their health and individual risk factors,” Andrei Perfilyev says.
By Natalia Kuznetsova