causaLens, the London deep tech company delivering the future of AI, has utilized its Causal AI technology in an important step towards adopting non-invasive methods for screening and understanding cancer. New research demonstrates that Causal AI enables reliable early detection of cancers based on easy-to-administer and cost-effective blood tests.
Using a strictly data-driven approach, causaLens, which this year received investment co-led by Dorilton Capital and Molten Ventures, discovered possiblcausal connections between the expression of genes and proteins and the manifestation and stage of colorectal cancer.
Colorectal cancer is the fourth most common cancer – with 147,950 cases annually – and one of the most lethal cancers – with 53,000 deaths per year.
At present, the only screening method used for colorectal cancer is colonoscopy, to identify and remove precursor lesions. However, this procedure is expensive and invasive, limiting reach for a type of cancer that is increasing by 2% a year among the under 50s, and requires ever-shorter screening intervals to prevent disease in higher-risk patients.
For these reasons, there is an urgent clinical need for techniques that can reliably detect early-stage colorectal cancers via non-invasive methods. The potential impact of causaLens’ research — undertaken in collaboration with academics from the Mayo Clinic, the prominent US medical research center — would be a significant improvement in the long-term prospects of patients with colorectal cancer.
causaLens is the pioneer of Causal AI — the only AI technology that is capable of discovering and reasoning with cause-and-effect relationships. Causal AI can root out spurious correlations in which two or more variables are associated but not causally related, due to either coincidence or the presence of a third, unseen factor.
The company has successfully delivered transformational outcomes across several sectors, from improving investment portfolio returns to helping mitigate supply chain disruptions and navigating public health crises.
Commenting on the company’s work in cancer research, Nicholas Chia, Assistant Professor of Biophysics, Mayo Clinic said:
“Causal AI is a fundamental scientific breakthrough and causaLens’ vision for Causal AI extends far beyond enterprise decision making. causaLens has the potential to disrupt a vast range of sectors and industries and has already demonstrated the value of its Causal AI technology in biological applications such as the discovery of cancer biomarkers”
