Cyclomics
CySeq® ALK-TRACK
Targeted and highly accurate ALK monitoring in circulating cell-free DNA from 0.5 - 1 ml blood draw. All clinically relevant ALK variants in a single assay, with turnaround time from sample to result in 4 days.
Key Highlights
✓ Targeted: 6 amplicons covering 19 clinically relevant ALK sites
✓ Sensitive: Designed for low-frequency variant detection
✓ Minimally invasive: Analysis from approximately 200 µL of blood
✓ Longitudinal: Enables repeated monitoring of ALK mutations
✓ Rapid: Approximately 4 days to 1-week turnaround time
Designed for longitudinal monitoring
Because ALK mutations can occur at low frequency and may change during disease progression, repeated molecular assessment could provide valuable information beyond a single tumor biopsy. ALK-TRACK is designed to support minimally invasive, longitudinal monitoring of ALK-mutant cancers, using serial blood samples to investigate changes in ALK variant detection over time.
Potential applications include:
• ALK mutation detection
• Molecular characterization of ALK-positive disease
• Monitoring of ALK variants during treatment
• Investigation of emerging ALK resistance mutations
Built for detection of ALK mutations any cancers,
designed with paediatric patients in mind.
Repeated tumor biopsies are challenging in pediatric patients. Liquid biopsy could provide a minimally invasive alternative, enabling molecular analysis from circulating cell-free DNA (cfDNA).
CySeq® ALK-TRACK is currently being validated in neuroblastoma patients at the Prinses Máxima Centrum for Paediatric Oncology, Europe's largest children's cancer center, Neuroblastoma is a childhood cancer in which ALK mutations are associated with high-risk disease. Most ALK mutations occur in the kinase domain, with major hotspots including F1174, F1245 and R1275. The emergence of ALK-targeted therapies highlights the need for sensitive molecular testing and longitudinal monitoring of ALK mutations.
Because ALK mutations can occur at low frequency and may change during disease progression, repeated molecular assessment could provide valuable information beyond a single tumor biopsy. ALK-TRACK is designed to support minimally invasive, longitudinal monitoring of ALK-mutant neuroblastoma, using serial blood samples to investigate changes in ALK variant detection over time.
Neuroblastoma is rare, but on Oxford Nanopore platforms samples need not be held back to fill a sequencing run, each child's sample can be processed on its own, so results arrive in days rather than weeks.
The Workflow
Step by Step
After cfDNA isolation, the DNA is amplified using the ALK-TRACK Multiplex PCR Panel (Step 1) to enrich the clinically relevant regions of the ALK kinase domain. The resulting PCR products are then processed with the CySeq® Short Fragment Sequencing solution (Step 2), where DNA molecules are circularized and amplified by rolling circle amplification (RCA) to generate long concatemers containing multiple copies of the original molecules. The concatemers are prepared for Oxford Nanopore sequencing (Step 3), enabling consensus-based analysis for sensitive detection of low-frequency ALK mutations in liquid biopsy samples (Step 4).
For research use only. Not for use in diagnostic procedures.