On April 28, 2025 Lumicell, Inc., a leader in developing innovative fluorescence-guided imaging technologies for cancer detection, reported the release of early clinical trial findings from the ex vivo feasibility study for molecular imaging in gastric cancer (Press release, Lumicell Diagnostics, APR 28, 2025, View Source [SID1234652275]).
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Today, Andrew T. Chan, MD, MPH, and David A. Drew, Ph.D. of the Clinical and Translational Epidemiology Unit and Division of Gastroenterology at Massachusetts General Hospital, presented during the session "Advances in the Detection and Treatment of Gastrointestinal Cancers" as a part of the Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) Gastric Cancer Open Scientific Session at this year’s American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) (Free AACR Whitepaper) Annual Meeting.
Dr. Drew presented compelling new findings highlighting the potential of cathepsin activity as a biomarker for gastric cancer, confirmed through single-cell analysis in patient samples and molecular profiling in genetically engineered mouse models. These findings support the use of pegulicianine-fluorescence imaging in detecting early-stage and neoadjuvant-treated gastric tumors.
In collaboration with Lumicell, Dr. Drew and Dr. Chan led the first clinical trial of pegulicianine in gastrointestinal cancer patients (NCT02584244). In this study, patients with diffuse and intestinal-type gastric cancers received intravenous pegulicianine prior to undergoing curative-intent surgical resection. Post-surgical specimens imaged ex vivo demonstrated strong, tumor-specific fluorescence signals, correlating with pathologically confirmed cancerous tissue. Importantly, pegulicianine was well tolerated by all study participants.
"Most gastric cancers are diagnosed at a locally advanced stage, with five-year survival rates below 30%," said Dr. Chan. "Current screening approaches, such as random biopsies during upper endoscopy, lack sensitivity. These findings represent a shift toward enabling early and more accurate detection."
Dr. Drew added, "We are thrilled to share these feasibility results. This work is propelling us toward real-time, in vivo endoscopic imaging, which could improve early detection strategies of gastric and gastroesophageal cancers in the at-risk patient population."
The next stage of this research is in progress, involving an in vivo clinical trial of pegulicianine and Lumicell’s newly developed endoscopic imaging system.