Tempus Announces BRCA Focused Initiative in Partne

CHICAGO, April 27, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Tempus, a technology company focused on helping doctors personalize cancer treatment by collecting, sorting and analyzing clinical and molecular data, has announced a new collaboration with cancer experts at the Basser Center for BRCA in the Abramson Cancer Center of the University of Pennsylvania to improve and personalize treatment for patients with heritable BRCA mutations.

Located within Penn Medicine's Abramson Cancer Center, the Basser Center is focused solely on the prevention and treatment of cancers that are associated with heritable BRCA mutations. Men and women with a gene mutation in either BRCA1 or BRCA2 are at heightened risk for developing certain cancers, including breast, ovarian, prostate and pancreatic cancer.

Using machine learning and advanced bioinformatics, Tempus will analyze the molecular and clinical data of patients who were treated at the Basser Center and harbor a BRCA mutation. In addition, Tempus will generate additional genomic and transcriptomic data for a subset of those patients. The goal is to help cancer specialists and research teams uncover novel patterns that will lead to better patient outcomes.   

“We are just beginning to unlock the mysteries behind certain heritable genetic mutations like BRCA,” said Eric Lefkofsky, Founder and CEO of Tempus. “The complexity of genetic mutations and their role in driving cancer can only be unlocked through the aggregation and analysis of vast amount of data.”

“The Basser Center is doing groundbreaking work aimed at saving the lives of men and women with heritable BRCA mutations. However, in order to accelerate the pace of discovery, we need to be able to understand why certain patients positively respond to treatment and others do not," said Dr. Susan M. Domchek, Executive Director, Basser Center for BRCA in the Abramson Cancer Center of the University of Pennsylvania.

This project follows an earlier collaboration between Tempus and the Abramson Cancer Center, focused on identifying the immunotherapies that are most likely to be effective for pancreatic and melanoma cancer patients.

About Tempus : Tempus is a technology company that is building the world’s largest library of molecular and clinical data and an operating system to make that data accessible and useful. We enable physicians to deliver personalized cancer care for patients through our interactive analytical and machine learning platform. We provide genomic sequencing services and analyze molecular and therapeutic data to empower physicians to make real-time, data-driven decisions. Our goal is for each patient to benefit from the treatment of others who came before by providing physicians with tools that learn as we gather more data. For more information, visit tempus.com and follow us on Facebook (Tempus Labs) and Twitter (@TempusLabs).

Contact: Tempus Clo Ewing Director of Communications Clothilde.ewing@tempus.com