Listed healthcare company and Leeds University secure £3.8m research grant

AIM-listed healthcare business Avacta and Leeds University have been awarded a £3.8m grant by the Medical Research Council towards the development of rapid diagnostic tools.

Wetherby-based Avacta, which provides diagnostic tools for the healthcare sector, has been concentrating on developing Affirmers, an engineered alternative to antibodies.

Its collaborative development programme with Leeds University aims to use Affimer reagents to differentiate between viral and bacterial infections, and differentiate bacterial strains.

This programme will develop ‘next generation’ biosensors to determine which bacterial strain has caused the infection so that the correct antibiotic can be quickly administered.

This will allow for more targeted use of antibiotics, reducing the number of wrongly prescribed treatments and increasing efficacy for patients, which will contribute to a reduction in anti-microbial resistance, Avacta said.

As part of the agreement between Avacta and the University of Leeds, Avacta will have the first rights to commercialise the new Affimer reagents and new diagnostic tests developed under the programme.

Alastair Smith, Avacta Group chief executive, said: “I am delighted that the potential of Affimer reagents to improve rapid diagnostics has been recognised by the Medical Research Council through this substantial funding. The combination with the innovative microfluidic devices developed at Leeds University is very promising and could lead to a new class of rapid test device.

“There is a growing, global need for diagnostic tests that differentiate bacterial strains. Anti-microbial resistance is a huge issue for healthcare providers and one that is only going to get worse if the prescription of antibiotics is not targeted by accurate and rapid diagnostics. This programme fits perfectly with our near term commercial strategy to focus on developing Affimer reagents for rapid diagnostics. It will deliver valuable Affimer reagents that are specific to key bacterial strains, which can be developed into a range of third party diagnostic platforms. In the longer term the programme will also deliver novel, microfluidic, rapid test devices, which may surpass existing technologies.

“This is another example of the continued strong momentum behind the Affimer technology and I look forward to reporting on progress on this and other applications.”