bioAffinity Technologies and Pictor Partner to Advance Next-Generation Precision Diagnostics for Asthma and COPD
bioAffinity Technologies, Inc., a biotechnology company focused on developing innovative cancer diagnostics and targeted therapeutics, has announced a strategic collaboration with Pictor®, Inc., a company specializing in targeted proteomic technologies. The partnership is aimed at accelerating the development and future commercialization of next-generation diagnostic tests designed to provide physicians with a deeper understanding of airway inflammation in patients living with asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).
The collaboration combines bioAffinity Technologies‘ expertise in flow cytometry with Pictor’s advanced targeted proteomic analysis platform to create comprehensive diagnostic tools capable of evaluating both immune cell populations and inflammatory protein signatures. By integrating these complementary technologies, the companies aim to deliver a more complete picture of the biological mechanisms driving respiratory diseases, ultimately supporting more personalized treatment decisions.
Addressing the Complexity of Chronic Airway Diseases
Asthma and COPD are among the world’s most common chronic respiratory disorders, affecting hundreds of millions of individuals worldwide. Although both conditions are characterized by airway inflammation, they are highly heterogeneous diseases involving multiple immune pathways and biological mechanisms. Patients with similar clinical symptoms often have different inflammatory profiles, meaning that treatments effective for one individual may be less effective for another.
As precision medicine continues to transform healthcare, clinicians are increasingly seeking diagnostic tools that move beyond symptom assessment and traditional pulmonary function tests. Modern therapies—including biologics that target specific inflammatory pathways—require accurate identification of the underlying disease biology to ensure patients receive the most appropriate treatment.
The partnership between bioAffinity Technologies and Pictor seeks to address this unmet need by developing laboratory-based diagnostics capable of simultaneously analyzing immune cells and inflammatory biomarkers from sputum samples.
Combining Two Advanced Diagnostic Technologies
Under the collaboration, bioAffinity Technologies will contribute its proprietary flow cytometry platform, which enables detailed identification and quantification of immune cell populations present within sputum samples. Flow cytometry provides valuable insights into the cellular components involved in airway inflammation, helping characterize the immune response occurring within the lungs.
Pictor will contribute its targeted proteomic platform, designed to rapidly measure multiple cytokines and inflammatory proteins produced by immune cells. Cytokines play a central role in regulating immune responses and are closely associated with various inflammatory pathways involved in asthma and COPD.
By integrating cellular analysis with protein profiling, the companies aim to create a comprehensive diagnostic platform capable of revealing both the immune cells involved in inflammation and the signaling molecules driving disease progression.
The resulting tests are expected to provide clinicians with a significantly more detailed understanding of each patient’s inflammatory profile than is currently available through conventional diagnostic approaches.
Improving Laboratory Efficiency and Scalability
Beyond the clinical advantages, the collaboration is also expected to enhance laboratory efficiency.
Maria Zannes, President and Chief Executive Officer of bioAffinity Technologies, emphasized that Pictor’s targeted proteomic platform offers significant operational benefits compared with traditional single-analyte testing methods.
According to Zannes, multiplex proteomic analysis can reduce laboratory complexity while improving throughput, lowering operating costs and enabling laboratories to process larger testing volumes more efficiently.
She noted that these efficiencies will be particularly important as demand grows for precision diagnostic testing in asthma and COPD, two conditions that affect millions of patients worldwide.
Zannes also highlighted Pictor’s expertise in product development and workflow optimization, describing the collaboration as an opportunity to accelerate commercialization while maintaining high laboratory performance standards.
Building Upon the CyPath® Lung Platform
The respiratory diagnostics under development leverage the same scientific foundation behind bioAffinity Technologies’ commercially available CyPath® Lung test.
CyPath Lung is a noninvasive diagnostic assay that analyzes sputum samples to help physicians determine the likelihood that a pulmonary nodule is malignant. The platform utilizes proprietary flow cytometry methods to evaluate cellular characteristics within respiratory samples.
Building on this established technology, the company is now expanding its capabilities beyond cancer diagnostics into inflammatory respiratory diseases.
Rather than focusing exclusively on cancer detection, the new diagnostic platform is intended to characterize complex inflammatory processes occurring within the lungs, providing physicians with actionable biological insights that may improve disease management.
bioAffinity Technologies anticipates initially offering these diagnostics as Laboratory Developed Tests (LDTs) operating under Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA) regulations.
Advancing Precision Medicine in Respiratory Care
Gordon Downie, MD, PhD, Chief Medical Officer of bioAffinity Technologies, emphasized that asthma and COPD should no longer be viewed as single diseases.
Instead, both disorders encompass multiple biological subtypes driven by distinct inflammatory mechanisms.
Some patients exhibit eosinophilic inflammation, while others display neutrophilic, mixed, or less well-defined inflammatory patterns. These differences influence disease severity, treatment response, and long-term outcomes.
According to Dr. Downie, integrating flow cytometry with cytokine profiling enables physicians to better understand the underlying biology responsible for an individual patient’s symptoms.
This comprehensive analysis may help clinicians identify the inflammatory pathways active within each patient and support more informed treatment decisions, particularly when considering advanced therapies such as FDA-approved biologic medications or emerging targeted immunotherapies.
The approach represents an important step toward precision medicine, where treatment strategies are tailored according to each patient’s unique biological profile rather than relying solely on clinical symptoms.
Understanding the Role of Cytokines
Cytokines are small signaling proteins produced by immune cells and various other cell types that regulate immune activity, inflammation, tissue repair, and cellular communication.
Different cytokine profiles are associated with different inflammatory endotypes of asthma and COPD.
For example, several currently approved biologic therapies specifically target cytokines such as IL-4, IL-5, IL-13, or their corresponding receptors. Accurate measurement of these inflammatory mediators can therefore provide valuable information regarding disease mechanisms and therapeutic selection.
Pictor’s proteomic platform is designed to measure multiple cytokines simultaneously, allowing clinicians to evaluate complex inflammatory signatures rather than relying on a single biomarker.
When combined with bioAffinity’s immune cell analysis, this integrated approach may provide a more complete representation of airway inflammation than existing diagnostic methods.
Intellectual Property and Development Rights
The collaboration clearly defines ownership of intellectual property generated through the partnership.
bioAffinity Technologies will retain ownership of its existing intellectual property, including multiple pending patent applications related to its asthma and COPD diagnostic platform. The company will also own intellectual property associated with any new diagnostic tests developed through the collaboration.
Pictor will maintain ownership of its existing targeted proteomic technologies as well as any future inventions directly related to improvements in its proteomic platform.
This structure allows both organizations to continue advancing their respective technology portfolios while jointly supporting development of integrated diagnostic solutions.
A Large and Growing Market Opportunity
The collaboration targets one of the largest therapeutic markets in healthcare.
According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), asthma and COPD affect more than 40 million Americans and over 650 million people globally.
The prevalence of these chronic respiratory disorders continues to increase due to aging populations, environmental factors, smoking-related disease, and improved diagnosis.
At the same time, pharmaceutical innovation has expanded rapidly, with increasing availability of biologic therapies designed to target specific inflammatory pathways.
The global asthma and COPD therapeutics market was valued at approximately $92 billion in 2024 and is projected to exceed $108 billion in 2026, eventually reaching more than $155 billion by 2030.
As treatment options become increasingly personalized, the demand for companion diagnostics capable of identifying appropriate patients is expected to grow significantly.
Experienced Leadership Driving Innovation
Pictor is led by Jamie Platt, PhD, who serves as Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director.
Dr. Platt joined bioAffinity Technologies’ Board of Directors in 2023 and brings extensive experience in diagnostic product development and commercialization.
Before leading Pictor, she played key leadership roles in two diagnostic companies that were ultimately acquired in transactions collectively valued at nearly $1 billion.
Since establishing its U.S. headquarters in 2025, Pictor has expanded adoption of its targeted proteomic platform through collaborations across pharmaceutical, laboratory, and research organizations.
Dr. Platt expressed enthusiasm for the new partnership, noting that combining bioAffinity’s expertise in immune cell biology with Pictor’s scalable proteomic technologies creates an opportunity to deliver diagnostics that move beyond identifying disease to understanding its underlying biology.
She emphasized that such insights have the potential to support more personalized treatment strategies and improve patient outcomes.
The collaboration between bioAffinity Technologies and Pictor represents an important step toward the next generation of precision diagnostics for chronic respiratory diseases. By integrating advanced flow cytometry with high-throughput targeted proteomic analysis, the companies aim to create laboratory tests capable of providing clinicians with comprehensive biological insights into asthma and COPD.
These next-generation diagnostics have the potential to improve patient stratification, support the selection of targeted biologic therapies, and enable more individualized disease management. As precision medicine continues to reshape respiratory care, comprehensive biomarker-driven testing could become an increasingly valuable tool for physicians seeking to optimize treatment decisions and improve long-term outcomes for millions of patients living with chronic inflammatory lung diseases worldwide.
About Pictor, Inc.
Pictor, Inc. is a global targeted proteomic platform company founded in New Zealand and headquartered in Carlsbad, California, with operations in New Zealand, Australia, and India. Pictor’s platform combines PictArray®, PictImager®, and Pictorial© software to support focused, multi-analyte protein analysis for human and animal health research environments. The company works with laboratories, biopharma companies, and other commercial partners to support development of targeted proteomic assays with efficient workflows designed to fit existing laboratory operations. Pictor’s IP portfolio includes 16 patents, five pending, and seven registered trademarks. For more information, visit www.pictorproteomics.com.
About bioAffinity Technologies, Inc.
bioAffinity Technologies, Inc. addresses the need for noninvasive diagnosis of early-stage cancer and other diseases of the lung and broad-spectrum cancer treatments. The Company’s first product, CyPath® Lung, is a noninvasive test that has shown high sensitivity, specificity and accuracy for the detection of early-stage lung cancer in clinical studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. CyPath® Lung is marketed as a Laboratory Developed Test (LDT) by Precision Pathology Laboratory Services, a subsidiary of bioAffinity Technologies. LDTs are overseen under the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA), which are administered by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.