University of Edinburgh spinoff Biocaptiva Ltd. is taking its cell free DNA (cfDNA) capture device to clinical trials in 2022 following promising preclinical results. The company’s platform technology is designed to increase the quantity of cfDNA available for liquid biopsy testing. Current liquid biopsy practices obtain cfDNA via a venous blood draw but the concentration of tumor-derived ctDNA can be too low for comprehensive testing. Biocaptiva’ device emerged from research at the University of Edinburgh investigating liquid biopsy technologies.

Investors have backed a new precision medicine company targeting clonal hematopoiesis with $40 million. Tensixteen Bio Inc. is on a mission to understand how somatic mutations influence age-related diseases, including cancer. The San Francisco-based startup will use the funds to develop a genomics and clinical platform that can identify patients at high risk of developing disease.

PERTH, Australia – After raising AU$7.5 million (US$5.4 million) in a private placement, biopharma company Servatus Ltd. is advancing its microbial biotherapeutics clinical programs targeting serious autoimmune conditions. The Coolum, Queensland-based private company is focused on identifying and developing live microbial biotherapeutics and engineered proteins to treat chronic and autoimmune diseases, as well as non-antibiotic treatments for bacterial infections.

PERTH, Australia – After raising AU$7.5 million (US$5.4 million) in a private placement, biopharma company Servatus Ltd. is advancing its microbial biotherapeutics clinical programs targeting serious autoimmune conditions. The Coolum, Queensland-based private company is focused on identifying and developing live microbial biotherapeutics and engineered proteins to treat chronic and autoimmune diseases, as well as non-antibiotic treatments for bacterial infections.

Following Philip Morris International Inc.’s controversial takeover of respiratory drug firm Vectura plc, British American Tobacco plc (BAT) is also making inroads into medical research with U.K.-based Kbio Holdings Ltd., a biotech focused on plant-based medicine.

Point-of-care (POC) diagnostics startup Chronus Health Inc. reeled in $22 million in a series A round led by Tarsadia Investments. The company plans to use the funds to scale its research, engineering and data science teams and hasten product and technology development. Monta Vista Capital, Sosv and Savantus Ventures also participated in the financings, along with an unidentified strategic investor.

Investors including SOSV, Cultivate(MD), Wavemaker360 Health, Blu Venture Investors and Broad Street Angels are backing Strados Labs LLC with $4.5 million. The pre-series A funding will be used to accelerate development of the company’s smart sensor platform Resp. The funding comes after Strados received FDA clearance for the product in December 2021 and brings its total raised to $7 million.

A new artificial intelligence (AI)-powered drug discovery startup, Protai Bio, has emerged from stealth mode following an $8 million seed round led by Grove Ventures and Pitango Healthtech that will see the new company develop a platform to accelerate drug discovery.

LONDON – The global pandemic has put the term mRNA on lips worldwide, but vaccines apart, the field of RNA therapeutics has failed to overcome the problem of delivery and is stuck at first base, targeting the liver. Newco Sixfold Bioscience Ltd. is the latest company working to end this constraint, applying a mixture of computation and advanced chemistry to design tissue-specific RNA delivery systems.

Protein profiling startup Nomic Bio has secured $17 million in an oversubscribed series A financing led by Lux Capital. The funds will be used to expand the company’s servicing and manufacturing labs in Montreal and Boston, to broaden access to its proteomic platform by scaling profiling capacity to 100,000 samples per quarter starting in the second quarter of 2022 and by scaling its protein-detection method, called nELISA, to 500 on-boarded proteins.