Fluidigm Establishes Center of Excellence at NCI-Designated Comprehensive Cancer Center to Advance Imaging Mass Cytometry

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., Feb. 10, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Fluidigm Corporation (Nasdaq:FLDM), an innovative biotechnology tools provider with a vision to improve life through comprehensive health insight, today announced that it will establish a new Center of Excellence (CoE) for Imaging Mass Cytometry™ at Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, an NCI-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center in Washington, DC. The Fluidigm^® CoE program will broaden the pace of adoption of mass cytometry through the development of new highly multiplexed panels for the study of cancer, immuno-oncology and immune-mediated diseases.

Imaging Mass Cytometry is revolutionizing translational and clinical research by providing unprecedented visualization of complex cellular phenotypes and their relationships in the context of tissue and tumor microenvironments. The new standard in highly multiplexed imaging, Imaging Mass Cytometry has been used in more than 45 research publications and a rapidly growing number of clinical studies. In a recent landmark clinical study released in Nature¹, researchers demonstrated the utility of the Hyperion™ Imaging System to identify new breast cancer cellular signatures that correlated with distinct clinical outcomes. These findings indicate that Imaging Mass Cytometry could become an invaluable tool to provide medically relevant spatial information for cancer treatment selection.

“As a practicing cancer immunotherapist, I view highly multiplexed spatial imaging capabilities as having the potential to help identify patients who will or will not benefit from a particular treatment, which could be paradigm-shifting for clinical practice,” said Dr. Louis Weiner, MD, Director of Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center. “Georgetown Lombardi is very pleased to be working with Fluidigm to further expand the utility of this important technology.”

Providing extensive expertise in biology and treatment of cancer, researchers from the Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center will collaborate with Fluidigm scientists in the development of new highly multiplexed tumor imaging panels to advance cancer research. Initial research studies will focus on demonstrating the utility of Imaging Mass Cytometry in the investigation of pancreatic cancer, lung cancer and liver transplantation.

“I am excited to be the inaugural Director of our new Center of Excellence for Imaging Mass Cytometry,” said Stephen Byers, PhD, Director of Georgetown University Medical Center Shared Resources and Associate Director at Georgetown Lombardi. “In addition to its promise in clinical cancer research, we anticipate that Imaging Mass Cytometry will be an important tool in the study of multiple other conditions such as infectious diseases, inflammation, fibrosis and neurodegenerative disorders. The development of mouse panels will also allow us to drive pre-clinical discovery and carry out proof-of-principle experiments.”

“We are honored to partner with the experienced team at Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center to further expand the utility of the Hyperion Imaging System for cancer research and catalyze the commercialization of high-value panels into the community at a faster rate,” said Andrew Quong, PhD, Chief Science Officer at Fluidigm. “By combining extensive expertise in cancer research and highly multiplexed imaging, this exciting collaboration has the potential to significantly advance our understanding of health and disease.” 

Supporting the global research community, this CoE will provide best practices for the implementation of Imaging Mass Cytometry in a core facility and will act as a reference site for new users. Members of the CoE will also gain early access to the latest Fluidigm imaging products to support research studies and provide valuable feedback to inform future product development.

“As the market leader of highly multiplexed imaging, with more than 85 Hyperion Imaging Systems enabled worldwide, we are committed to developing an expanding menu of imaging antibodies, panels and applications to help researchers identify new cellular biomarkers and accelerate therapeutic development,” said Chris Linthwaite, President and CEO of Fluidigm. “This partnership represents an important milestone in our strategy to accelerate the global adoption of Imaging Mass Cytometry through content expansion. We look forward to working together with the distinguished team at Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center and further expanding our CoE program in the future with those who share our vision for advancing health care research.”

About Imaging Mass Cytometry
Imaging Mass Cytometry is setting a new standard in tissue imaging, significantly simplifying high-multiplex panel design and eliminating the impact of tissue autofluorescence by using highly pure metal tags for which signals are separated by mass instead of by wavelength. Incorporating an easy-to-use immunohistochemistry workflow that simultaneously detects many proteins in a single scan, Imaging Mass Cytometry is ideal for uncovering new insights in health and disease and empowering the development of better diagnostics and more effective therapies.

About Fluidigm
Fluidigm (Nasdaq:FLDM) is an industry-leading biotechnology tools provider with a vision to improve life through comprehensive health insight. We focus on the most pressing needs in translational and clinical research, including cancer, immunology, and immunotherapy. Using proprietary CyTOF^® and microfluidics technologies, we develop, manufacture, and market multi-omic solutions to drive meaningful insights in health and disease, identify biomarkers to inform decisions, and accelerate the development of more effective therapies. Our customers are leading academic, government, pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and plant and animal research laboratories worldwide. Together with them, we strive to increase the quality of life for all. For more information, visit fluidigm.com.

Fluidigm, the Fluidigm logo, CyTOF, Hyperion and Imaging Mass Cytometry are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Fluidigm Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. Fluidigm products are provided for Research Use Only. Not for use in diagnostic procedures.

Forward-Looking Statements for Fluidigm 
This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including, among others, statements regarding growth in adoption of Fluidigm technologies and products, applications and benefits for such technologies and products, and benefits of contractual arrangements. Forward-looking statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from currently anticipated results, including but not limited to risks relating to challenges inherent in developing, manufacturing, launching, marketing, and selling new products; potential product performance and quality issues; intellectual property risks; competition; uncertainties in contractual relationships; and reductions in research and development spending or changes in budget priorities by customers. Information on these and additional risks and uncertainties and other information affecting Fluidigm business and operating results is contained in Fluidigm’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2018, and in its other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date hereof. Fluidigm disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements except as may be required by law.

Reference
1 Jackson, H.W., Fischer, J.R., Zanotelli, V.R. et al. “The single-cell pathology landscape of breast cancer.” Nature. 20 January 2020, DOI: 10.1038/s41586-019-1876-x.

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