Duke University School of Medicine’s newly announced partnership with industry will give researchers the ability to develop models to discover new therapies, match patients to the right therapies, and detect disease earlier.
In a collaboration with the company Network Bio, Duke will partner to generate multi-omic datasets, accelerating translational research and expanding infrastructure and funding opportunities for researchers.
“The partnership will enable advanced molecular profiling and molecular sequencing, which can be costly for academic researchers,” said Svati Shah, MD, the Ursula Geller Distinguished Professor of Cardiology and director of the Center for Precision Health at Duke.
Duke and Network Bio will work together to collect data based on Duke’s biobanks, using de-identified data and samples from research participants who have given consent.
The partnership will generate multi-omics data on banked samples and pair the molecular data with de-identified clinical records. The resulting datasets will train AI models designed to detect disease earlier, match patients to the right therapies, and find new drug targets.
“The work could identify biomarkers, patient subgroups, and therapeutic targets faster,” said Shah, “creating a stronger path to clinical validation.”
Duke is uniquely positioned to lead this acceleration of translational research through clinical expertise, diverse biobanks, integrated research infrastructure, and strong omics and data-science capabilities.