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India’s efforts in bioinformatics and next-generation sequencing (NGS) indicate a shift from dependency to leadership in innovation. Fuelled by strong institutional support, a growing startup ecosystem, and world-class scientific talent, the country is no longer just participating in global genomics research but is actively shaping it.
Dr. Pankaj Kumar, senior scientist, Strand Life Sciences noted that among the most promising advancements in immunotherapy are chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) therapies and immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs).
CAR-T cells are genetically engineered immune cells with special proteins that can recognize and attack cancer cells. The first indigenously developed Indian CAR-T cell therapy, NexCAR19 was approved for use by the Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) in October 2023. Although CAR-T cell therapies are currently only approved for use in blood cancers, their effectiveness against solid tumours, specifically gastric cancers, has also been recently demonstrated. This is a major breakthrough as 90% of all cancers are solid tumours, he added.
Newer and more effective ICIs are also being developed and tested, with the latest one, cosibelimab-ipdl, being approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in December 2024 for use in skin cancers. The development and progression of immunotherapies went hand-in-hand with advances in molecular techniques and a boom in bioinformatics.
Molecular techniques such as Next Generation Sequencing (NGS), RNA sequencing (RNA-seq), and CITE-seq (Cellular Indexing of Transcriptomes and Epitopes) have been pivotal in advancing immunotherapies. RNA-seq, which measures gene expression, reveals which genes are active and how their activities change in response to specific conditions or treatments. CITE-seq combines RNA-seq and antibody-based protein detection to simultaneously measure gene expression and the presence of surface proteins at a single-cell resolution.
All these molecular techniques are used in different stages of immunotherapy research and development. For example, NGS is useful in identifying gene targets for the development of ICIs. Single cell RNA-seq can identify genes associated with T-cell exhaustion, a condition where CAR-T cells gradually lose their cancer-killing capacity. CITE-seq can be used to distinguish between active and exhausted T-cells or map out which immune cells suppress the body’s defenses by characterizing the expression of various surface proteins. For CAR-T cell and ICI developers, this provides critical information for designing and optimizing therapies, he stated.
But the true potential of advanced NGS techniques has been harnessed because of innovations in bioinformatics. India’s bioinformatics and NGS capabilities have come a long way, with homegrown innovation playing a big role in shaping global research. One of the companies quietly leading the way is Strand Life Sciences, with its deep expertise in NGS-based assays, multi-omics integration, and customized bioinformatics pipelines. Armed with over 25 years of experience, they have empowered researchers to translate complex molecular data into meaningful insights that guide therapy development, Dr Kumar told Pharmabiz in an email.
Multi-omics platforms to combine epigenomics and spatial transcriptomics are now pushing the envelope in the cancer-care and research sector by supporting innovations in CAR-T cell and ICI immunotherapies. As these fields progress, advanced bioinformatics tools and workflow systems are also evolving to keep pace and transform the landscape of personalized medicine, he said.
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