Biomarkers, Orphan Diseases and New Directions in TBI Research at the 5th Annual Traumatic Brain Injury Conference - April 15, 16, 2015 Washington DC

    WASHINGTON, DC, March 19, 2015 /24-7PressRelease/ -- What if traumatic brain injury was composed not just of three types of injury - mild (concussion), moderate and severe - but was actually a number of distinctly separate orphan diseases grouped under the acute brain trauma umbrella? What if these orphan diseases each featured distinctive and unique biomarkers, treatment protocols and pharmaceutical solutions followed by specifically targeted rehabilitation programs?

This is the provocative early idea that has emerged from the last few years of intensive TBI research. However, this conclusion is still preliminary because the biomarkers of TBI, unlike those of other acute injuries such as heart attack, are not yet precise and conclusive enough to provide clinicians with the objective information needed to categorize TBI into sub-types. Reliable biomarkers are urgently needed to accurately classify brain injuries.

One of the lead themes of the 2015 TBI Conference involves biomarker discovery or development. Research teams in many different areas are working intensively to discover and confirm reliable biomarkers of TBI damage in a critical foundational area of TBI research.

"One important objective of TBI research is to find the biomarkers and technologies that will allow researchers to begin conclusively categorizing the different kinds of brain trauma," said John Waslif, Managing Director of Arrowhead Publishers, the producers of the TBI conference. "The 2015 TBI Conference is pleased to feature a number of speakers who will present their work advancing objective biomarkers and imaging designed to inform and move TBI research closer to the goal of developing definitive biomarkers and tests."

One significant benefit of biomarker progress is that it also enables a more rigorous classification system which in turns enables researchers to differentiate the emerging unique types of TBI. In addition, and importantly, objective biomarkers allow clinical trials to develop relevant endpoints that can be monitored to determine progress for a pharmaceutical or treatment. A treatment has a much greater chance of receiving regulatory approval if there are clinically relevant and defensible endpoints to target.

TBI as a family of orphan diseases
The idea that TBI may be a family of related but distinct orphan diseases is gaining increasing favor as new research findings increasingly demonstrate significant differentiation in TBI. Existing and emerging biomarkers have the potential to support a classification system for TBI that would enable targeted therapy development. Ramona Hicks, PhD, chief science officer of One Mind and formerly program director, TBI research program at NIH-NINDS, will kick off the biomarkers section of the conference Thursday afternoon. She'll provide an outline of this emerging theory in her presentation entitled: "Turning TBI into Multiple Orphan Diseases: Biomarkers for TBI Classification."

Ramon Diaz-Arrastia, MD, PhD, of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences will speak to ischemia in TBI and the use of LiCox monitoring while Michael Frankel, MD, from Emory University will present on the topic "Serum Biomarkers of Injury and Outcome in the ProTECT III Clinical Trial" to determine the efficacy of four serum biomarkers in TBI.

Andreas Jeromin, PhD, of Quanterix Corporation, will describe case studies detecting total tau blood in sport-related concussion using the company's ultra sensitive single molecule array (Simoa) technology for the detection of low abundance neurological and neurodegenerative biomarkers. Sergey Dryga, PhD, of BioDirection, Inc. will present on using the company's Tbit Nanowire technology for the Rapid Detection of TBI Biomarkers.

Stuart Hoffman, PhD, of the Department of Veterans Affairs, will devote part of his presentation on the Federal Interagency Coordination of Traumatic Brain Injury Research to federal efforts in promoting serum/CSF, imaging, and physiological biomarkers to diagnose and prognose TBI. He will also discuss identifying objective end points and determining the therapeutic response of potential therapeutics.

In addition, a number of other speakers will present information on their research programs on biomarker development, including the use of advanced imaging in CTE and TBI during life to identify more accurate and earlier-stage diagnostic tools for TBI and concussion. These presentations demonstrate that significant progress is being made dealing with the thorny challenge of identifying TBI quickly and accurately.

More information, including registration, the most up-to-date scientific presentation agenda, sponsor/exhibitor opportunities and our scientific poster session, can be found at www.tbiconference.com.

# # #