Helix BioS, a bioinformatics company associated with the Madrid Science Park, has signed an agreement with the Institute for Cellular and Molecular Studies (ICM) to assist them in interpreting the computational processes and data analysis of over 3,000 monthly genetic procedures to be carried out in their new laboratories. The project’s goal, once it reaches its initially planned performance, will be to achieve figures around 24,000 annual procedures
The importance of this collaboration lies, in the words of the company’s CEO, José María Lezcano, in that “with this process we can identify those variations associated with a disease that can give much more reliable clues to a clinician when establishing a diagnosis or treatment.”
Helix BioS’s task is, after genetic extractions, to find pathological variations using sophisticated algorithms: “The sequencers provide all the raw DNA information, without order or filtering. That’s where our mission begins: to reassemble that genetic puzzle, assembling hundreds of thousands of small reading fragments, ordering them, and from that point, searching for and identifying all variants. Once identified, a comparison is made with multiple databases where even more information about these variants is found, relating them.”
The joint work between ICM and Helix BioS thus becomes an essential tool in the field of personalized medicine. Proof of this is that the project already has the confidence of the Quirónsalud hospital group.
