American firm Agilent Technologies has recently signed a Research Collaboration Agreement (RCA) with the National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) outlining their collaboration to accelerate translational cancer research on the genomic landscape of Asian-prevalent cancers over the next two years.

The scope of the agreement includes the supply of an Agilent Magnis Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Preparation System to help investigate details specific to Asian cancer cohorts, where tissue samples derived from routine clinical care remain limited locally and regionally.

Agilent's fully-automated NGS library preparation platform, with its installation at Singapore's Cancer Discovery Hub (CDH), aims to deliver reproducible results by simplifying an assay of multiple genes and complex genetic aberrations from genomic DNA. The research work focuses on better characterising tumor genomes and advancing the use of this data in patient care to transform clinical trials and diagnostics in oncology and improve treatment decisions.  

This year, Agilent also signed another agreement with NCCS to provision biomarker testers for the research in molecular profiling of cancers. For more than 20 years, Agilent has invested in Singapore as a trusted life sciences and diagnostics partner.