Our Solution

With CIDosis, we provide a non-invasive device, allowing CID patients to monitor their own inflammation status. CIDosis aims to improve the quality of life for patients who suffer from chronic inflammatory diseases by providing a patch that will detect levels of inflammatory markers in their sweat. This patch can be placed under the armpit of the patient where it will be continuously collecting sweat during the day, resulting in a color output translating the inflammatory status. Our self-monitoring patch, CIDosis, is an easy-to-use, non-invasive device suitable for home use, and will decrease the need for frequent hospital visits, thereby making life easier for the patients. It allows for transparency for the patient regarding their disease progression and is a tool that can help them discover the best self-management strategy for their disease. Not only can it alleviate the burden of hospital visits, but it can provide valuable information on the therapeutic efficacy of certain drugs, allowing for faster treatment adjustments and continuous dosage regulations as the disease progresses. We envision the use of this patch as a future self-monitoring system for patients suffering from inflammatory diseases worldwide. With the CIDosis patch they have access to a cheap, non-invasive method to measure their daily inflammation in an easy way and track their condition. The utility of such a device is extensive and can alleviate the struggles of many patient groups from Crohn’s disease to Arthritis.

Scientific approach

We are engineering the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae to sense presence of inflammation biomarkers (interleukins/cytokines) in human sweat. The yeast is located inside a sweat patch specifically designed for this purpose. Our SPY (Sweat Patch with Yeast) device is placed on the skin, where it continually collects sweat from the patient. The yeast expresses a colored pigment to reflect the level of a certain interleukin of choice. The vision is a modular design, allowing for easy swap of the interleukin receptor in the yeast, so the patch can be tailored to the need of the individual patient group. The yeast is powered by designed receptors that boast very high sensitivity and selectivity, coupled with an efficient pheromone pathway for signal amplification. The SPY can be photographed with a specialized app to analyze the exact level of coloration regardless of light conditions.

The detailed step of the scientific development includes:

Interleukin receptor modification Human interleukin receptors are cloned into yeast, via a fusion between the extracellular receptor domain and an endogenous yeast transmembrane protein. Successful ligand-receptor binding is tested via a common split-ubiquitin signal assay.

Hijacking the yeast pheromone pathway The interleukin signal is amplified for more precise measurement by hijacking the signal amplification steps of the pheromone pathway in yeast. Endogenous G-alpha proteins are modified to induce the pathway upon ligand-receptor binding.

Signal transduction via color expression The signal pathway will, post amplification, induce the transcription of a colorful pigment that will then be expressed in the yeast cell, resulting in a clear, visual color change of the yeast colony.