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2020 Edison Patent Award Recipient

Dr. Robert G Nagele

Rowan University and inventor Dr. Robert G Nagele receives a patent award in the Medical Health Diagnostic category for “Diagnostic Biomarker Profiles for the Detection and Diagnosis of Alzheimer’s Disease” (U.S. 10,132,817). This invention provides methods, compositions and kits for a blood test for early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) based on detection of disease-specific autoantibodies as blood-based biomarkers. The goal is to definitively diagnose early-stage AD in patients that arrive for the first time in their doctor’s office with a cognitive or memory complaint. Currently, diagnosing early-stage AD has been difficult and often inconclusive even after using expensive neuropsychological evaluations and brain imaging. This test is based on the finding that all humans have thousands of self-reactive antibodies (called autoantibodies) in their blood that function to clear cell and tissue debris their bodies generate daily. Relevant to the patent, in the presence of disease, the amount of cell debris produced and released into the blood by the diseased organs or tissues is dramatically increased. In response, the immune system markedly increases production of the specific autoantibodies charged with clearing this disease-specific debris from the blood. This new test uses a single drop of blood to detect the increased levels of these disease-associated autoantibodies as blood-based biomarkers for early AD detection. Thus far, there are no blood-based diagnostic tests for early-stage AD. The development of an accurate, relatively noninvasive, inexpensive blood-based diagnostic test for early stages of AD will be of great benefit to patients afflicted with this disease since early treatment greatly increases the likelihood of a successful outcome. In addition, it would allow earlier enrollment into AD clinical trials seeking new treatments and would also facilitate the monitoring of disease progression in patients who are under treatment by their physicians or participating as subjects in clinical trials. Rowan University has licensed a portfolio of technologies in the neurodegenerative sector (including this patent) to a startup, Durin Technologies. Durin has managed to raise significant investment from different sources and is currently moving forward in seeking FDA approval for blood-based tests for preclinical (presymptomatic) AD, prodromal AD and mild-moderate AD using autoantibodies as biomarkers and human protein microarrays as a platform.