Phase Holographic Imaging and University of California, San Francisco Commence Collaboration on Skin Cancer Research

SAN FRANCISCO and LUND, Sweden, October 26, 2015 /PRNewswire/ --

University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and Phase Holographic Imaging (PHI) have begun their collaboration agreement to accelerate on-going skin cancer research utilizing PHI's proprietary label-free holographic imaging cytometry technology. The newly released version of the HoloMonitor® M4 has been delivered to UCSF. The program will focus on establishing the best practices and validating the most useful HoloMonitor M4 parameters for simultaneous detection of changes in proliferation, cell death and motility in primary human melanomas and cultured melanocytes.

The collaboration will be led by Robert Judson, PhD, UCSF Sandler Faculty Fellow and NIH Early Independence Award Fellow, whose interests concentrate on developing novel strategies for early detection of melanoma. According to the American Cancer Society, melanoma accounts for less than 2% of skin cancers but contributes to a large majority of skin cancer deaths. The incidence of melanoma is on the rise with over 70 0000 new diagnoses and close to 10 000 related deaths expected in the US in 2015.

"Our mission is to develop an understanding of human melanoma by engineering its progression in vitro and use this knowledge to drive discoveries in prevention, diagnostics and treatment of this deadly disease," said Dr. Judson and continued:

"Using techniques in molecular biology, biochemistry, genetics, imaging, and tissue culture, we are probing a variety of intrinsic and extrinsic factors for their ability to render melanocytes susceptible to malignant transformation. The original purchase of PHI's HoloMonitor M4 instrument in 2014 was essential for our ability to detect subtle changes in a variety of oncogenic phenotypes with single cell resolution within larger populations. As a label-free, non-toxic imaging system, the M4 provides us the means to begin investigating the immediate reaction of melanoma cells to acute environmental and genetic stimuli. The new instrument equipped with motorized stage and advanced data acquisition software will bring additional benefits of automated walk-away analysis and higher throughput." 

As a result of this collaboration UCSF and PHI expect to validate novel label-free cellular assays, develop best HoloMonitor technology practices and apply them to testing of therapeutic agents in primary and genetically engineered melanoma cell lines.

"We are excited to deliver our new HoloMonitor instrumentation to the lab recently launched by Dr. Judson and begin our collaboration by providing support of novel research programs in the study of skin cancer. We view the collaboration with UCSF as an exciting first step towards expanding our Centers of Excellence in Holographic Imaging Cytometry to the San Francisco area," said CEO Peter Egelberg.