SENTINEL project awarded to develop new implantable tools for continuous remote monitoring of cancer patients

An international research and development consortium announces the launch of the SENTINEL project aimed at developing a radical new approach to remotely monitor prostate cancer patients that have undergone curative surgery.

According to the Global Cancer Observatory (World Health Organization), prostate cancer accounts to 1.3 million new cases annually worldwide. If prostate cancer is diagnosed at an early stage, these patients have a 5-year survival rate of almost 100 %; however, for those patients with advanced disease (metastasis) the 5-year survival decreases to 31 %.  In order to increase the chances for metastatic patients, early identification of cancer relapse is crucial, but this is nowadays limited by low sensitivity and specificity of tumor biomarkers, and by the accuracy of related assays. Despite prostate-specific antigen (PSA) being the first approved cancer biomarker for diagnosis, screening and monitoring of prostate cancer, the analysis of PSA- is still not enough to identify patients with high risk of relapse early on. SENTINEL aims to improve current predictive rates and contribute to a more cost-effective and accessible diagnosis and monitoring in prostate cancer patients at high risk of tumor relapse.

The SENTINEL concept aims at bringing home patient monitoring to a whole different level by developing an injectable, hydrogel-based biosensor integrating plasmonic particles to be implanted following a simple and painless procedure. The biosensor shall support detection and monitoring of cancer biomarkers using a handheld device that collects and analyzes Raman spectra through machine learning algorithms to provide personalized clinical outputs.

SENTINEL is expected to contribute to a novel generation of In Vitro Diagnostic technologies supporting remote patient monitoring, that can be expanded to other types of cancer and even to other health conditions.

SENTINEL project is funded with almost 2 million€  under the UT Austin Portugal Program and joins an international consortium from 2020 to 2023 led by Stemmatters and composed by INL, ICVS, 2CA, and UT Austin.

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