All the money in the world couldn’t sadly save Apple’s supreme Steve Jobs who died from pancreatic cancer.

But hopefully our latest technological advances and medical research will enable others to be saved from an early death.

Recalling Jobs’ gaunt and hollow expression is a potent reminder for us all that early diagnosis is vital for survival.

So I congratulate my clients Abcodia on their latest collaboration with Oxford Gene Technology which is aimed at improving early detection of pancreatic cancer. The full press release can be read here.

Abcodia is engaged in the validation and discovery of biomarkers of cancer and other age-related diseases. The company’s prospective biobank has over 5 million serum samples derived from more than 200,000 initially healthy volunteers, 50,000 of whom have provided samples annually, making this an ideal resource for identifying biomarkers for disease screening. You can view our video here.

As part of this collaboration, Abcodia will provide data mining expertise to deliver optimal sample sets from its large prospective serum biobank, taken from individuals up to 7 years before the diagnosis of pancreatic cancer.  OGT will apply its functional protein array platform and its Genefficiency microRNA profiling array to identify pancreatic cancer specific biomarkers that can be used as diagnostic indicators of developing pancreatic cancer.

I’m sure Jobs would have relished the vast potential of genetic research and technology – hopefully saving countless lives. Maye not his, but future generations could benefit from the discoveries of this latest collaboration.