At the Palau de la Generalitat on Wednesday, December 14, Joaquim Nadal, the Catalan Government’s Minister for Research and Universities, presented the first Joan Roget Prizes for Knowledge Transfer, jointly awarded by the Ministry and the Catalan Foundation for Research and Innovation (FCRI). The prizes, divided into three categories worth 5,000 euros each, recognise successful cases in the field of knowledge transfer. Their goal is to highlight the work that individuals, projects and organisations carry out with the goal of transferring research results into clinical practice. The prize in the category of Collaborative Research in Transfer went to Reveal Genomics, a spin-off directed by Aleix Prat, head of the IDIBAPS Translational genomics and targeted therapies in solid tumours research group.
Reveal Genomics develops precision tools used to diagnose cancer based on the combination of different genetic data. In early-2022, the company announced the commercialisation of the HER2DX test, the first in the world to enable personalisation of the treatment of HER2-positive breast cancer (HER2+). Analysing RNA from 27 genes, HER2DX predicts patient survival and the likelihood of the response to drug treatment. This enables a more accurate diagnosis to be made and helps doctors to take decisions about therapies based on the potentially beneficial effect of treatment and the likelihood of relapse, improving the patient's quality of life in both the short and long term. Data on the efficacy of the trial was published in the journal The Lancet EBioMedicine. HER2DX, now recognised by the Joan Roget Award, is the result of collaboration between the teams led by Prat and Pierfranco Conte of the University of Padua.
Breast cancer currently accounts for 25% of all cancers diagnosed in women. HER2+ accounts for 20% of all breast cancers and a substantial proportion of deaths, as it is a clinically and biologically heterogeneous malignancy in which patients present very different responses to treatment.
