The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is seeking to block Illumina Inc.’s $7.1 billion purchase of Grail Inc., claiming the deal will “diminish innovation in the U.S. market” for multicancer early detection (MCED) tests, which could be used to flag dozens of tumor types when they are still treatable. Illumina has vowed to “pursue all legal options” to complete its acquisition of Grail, arguing that it does not compete with Grail and is committed to providing “unfettered access” to its NGS technology.

PARIS – Barely one year after its formation, startup company Quantiq SAS has just closed an $825,000 seed round, to develop its contactless medical diagnostics technology. French business angels from the medical, artificial intelligence and fintech worlds participated in this initial fundraising.

PERTH, Australia – Ferronova Ltd. has developed an injectable magnetic and fluorescent tracer that can map the spread of cancer in the lymph nodes more accurately for improving the staging of complex cancers. The polymer-coated iron oxide nanoparticles show more detailed assessment of sentinel lymph nodes and detect micro-metastasis and isolated tumor cells that would otherwise not be detected.

Teleradiology company Nines Inc. won 510(k) clearance from the FDA for Ninesmeasure, an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered tool for measuring lung nodules. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company says the new tool can help speed the diagnosis of certain respiratory diseases, resulting in better patient outcomes.

Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. has launched a surveillance system that can detect SARS-CoV-2 in ambient air in indoor spaces, providing a potential complement to individual testing and other COVID-19 safety protocols. The system, called the Aerosolsense Sampler, works by capturing a sample of the ambient air on a cartridge using Thermo Fisher’s collection substrate.

Somalogic Inc. has agreed to go public via a merger with blank-check company CM Life Sciences II. Upon closing, CMLS II – a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) sponsored by affiliates of Casdin Capital LLC and Corvex Management LP – will be renamed Somalogic and its common stock listed on the Nasdaq Global Market under the ticker symbol SLGC.

LONDON – Getting a handle on the specificity and sensitivity of rapid COVID-19 antibody tests, how they compare to each other and how they should be applied in population screening to understand who has had the virus and how it has spread, has been a source of difficulty and dispute between manufacturers, clinicians and public health experts.

South San Francsico-based Twist Bioscience Corp. and Biotia Inc., of New York, received the first FDA emergency use authorization (EUA) for a capture-based next-generation sequencing (NGS) assay for the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. The technique reduces the likelihood of misdiagnosing or failing to identify mutations compared to standard sequencing.

TORONTO – A distinguished Canadian health care policy expert said a report from Canada’s COVID-19 Testing and Screening Expert Advisory Panel recommending testing and screening for school-age children and teachers comes “late in the game” now that the focus has shifted to vaccinating the Canadian population.

Fluxergy Inc. said Thursday that it has won CE-IVD marking for its one-hour COVID-19 real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test. The automated, sample-to-action Fluxergy diagnostic testing system can run multiple assay types – such as molecular, immunochemistry, chemistry and cytometry – simultaneously on the same cartridge. The SARS-CoV2 RT-PCR test is the first CE-marked product for the Fluxergy diagnostic platform.