All About Proteins with Erisyon

Sep 16, 2021 | Science in the Mall, Y'all Podcast

Detecting disease biomarkers:

It’s very exciting to have access to so many interesting and innovative ways that people are addressing problems related to pandemic preparedness and global health security. Being on the founding team of TEXGHS (Science in the Mall, Y’all Episode 10), we have companies present to us their solutions for pandemic preparedness. Many of them are technologies that are brand new, as a response to the pandemic, and others are existing technologies with a new application or a renewed relevance. Member company, Erisyon, has been working on their single molecule protein sequencing technology since long before there was a pandemic. The ability to detect disease biomarkers which often have previously undetectable, but hugely consequential, post translational modifications, cancer cells expressing mutated antigens on their surface as well as, camouflaged viruses will provide huge breakthroughs in disease diagnosis and treatment. From the Erisyon episode of Science in the Mall, Y’all:

One way that a virus like SARS-CoV-2 evades the immune system is by decorating its envelope with sugars in a process known as glycosylation. These sugars act as a camouflage, hiding the virus from the body’s defenses. Fluorosequencing can help with pandemic preparedness by identifying glycosylation patterns of zoonotic viruses before they move between species. These signatures can be compared to or assayed with human models to predict how infectious they may or may not be. If a virus is deemed to have a human vector, then tests, treatments, and vaccines can be developed well before an outbreak occurs.

After several years of work, Erisyon is on its way to making this single molecule sequencing capabilities available to others with the commercialization of their unique instrument. We are excited to have a front row seat to this work and couldn’t be more excited at the possibilities this technology will provide. We sat down and talked to cofounders Angela Bardo and Jag Swaminathan in Episode 11 of our Science in the Mall, Y’all podcast. While it’s a complicated and brilliant technology, it was really fun to hear how well Jag was able to bring it down the layperson’s level with his simple analogies. It’s a fun listen and I encourage you to tune in.Nancy Lyon
Interim DirectorListen on your favorite platform:
YouTube // Acast // Spotify // iApple Podcasts // Google Podcasts