One Biosciences and Institut Curie Secure €3.3 Million France 2030 Funding to Advance Single-Cell Diagnostics for Triple-Negative Breast Cancer
One Biosciences, a techbio company spun out of Institut Curie and focused on developing clinical-grade single-cell tumor profiling technologies, and Institut Curie, a leading French cancer research and treatment center, have announced €3.3 million in funding from Bpifrance through the France 2030 i-Démo program to support the CAST project, or Cancer Single-cell Analysis for Therapy.
The four-year initiative is designed to accelerate the development and clinical deployment of single-cell tumor profiling technology for cancer care, with an initial focus on triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC). Through the project, the organizations aim to advance One Biosciences’ OneMap™ platform toward commercialization as an in vitro diagnostic test capable of providing clinicians with detailed information about the cellular composition and biology of individual tumors.
The funding marks an important step in efforts to move single-cell analysis from specialized research environments into routine clinical practice. By combining single-cell transcriptomics with artificial intelligence, the CAST project seeks to address limitations associated with conventional diagnostic approaches, which can average biological signals across large numbers of cells and potentially overlook the tumor heterogeneity that contributes to treatment resistance and disease progression.
Addressing Challenges in Triple-Negative Breast Cancer
Triple-negative breast cancer accounts for approximately 15% to 20% of breast cancer cases and is widely recognized as one of the more difficult breast cancer subtypes to treat. Unlike hormone receptor-positive or HER2-positive breast cancers, TNBC lacks three commonly targeted biomarkers, limiting the number of established targeted treatment options available to patients.
Patients with TNBC can face a substantial risk of relapse and rapid disease progression. Although chemotherapy, immunotherapy and combinations of systemic treatments have expanded therapeutic options, clinicians continue to face challenges in determining which patients are most likely to respond to particular treatment strategies.
One of the key challenges is the biological diversity within individual tumors. A tumor is not necessarily composed of identical cancer cells. Instead, it can contain multiple populations of malignant and non-malignant cells with different molecular characteristics and behaviors. Some cellular populations may respond to treatment, while others can survive therapy and contribute to disease recurrence or resistance.
Traditional diagnostic testing can provide valuable information, but analyses that average signals across millions of cells may fail to capture these important differences. CAST is intended to address this limitation by examining tumors at the level of individual cells.
OneMap™ Brings Single-Cell Analysis Toward Clinical Use
At the center of the CAST project is OneMap™, One Biosciences’ single-cell diagnostic platform. The technology combines single-cell transcriptomics with artificial intelligence to analyze tumor samples at individual-cell resolution.
According to the companies, the platform is designed to generate clinically actionable reports within approximately two weeks using standard hospital biopsy samples. This turnaround time is intended to make high-resolution molecular analysis more practical for clinical decision-making, where treatment choices often need to be made within a relatively limited timeframe.
Rather than treating a tumor as a single biological entity, OneMap™ is designed to characterize the different cellular populations present within a tumor and identify signatures that could be associated with treatment response or resistance.
The ultimate objective is to provide oncologists with more detailed information that can complement conventional pathology and molecular testing. Such information could potentially help physicians determine which treatment approach is most appropriate for an individual patient based on the biological characteristics of their tumor.
For TNBC, the platform is particularly focused on identifying cellular signatures that may help predict response to immunotherapy and chemotherapy combinations.
Building on Initial Research
The CAST program builds on research already conducted collaboratively by One Biosciences and Institut Curie. Initial studies have demonstrated the ability to generate high-quality single-cell data from routine TNBC biopsy samples, according to the organizations.
The research has also identified cellular signatures associated with response to immunotherapy. These findings provide a foundation for the next stage of development, in which the organizations will seek to validate predictive biomarkers and establish the performance of the technology in a larger, clinically annotated patient population.
A major component of the project will be access to Institut Curie’s clinical expertise and patient resources. Through its Institute of Women’s Cancers, co-founded with PSL University and INSERM, Institut Curie provides access to a cohort of more than 300 patients with triple-negative breast cancer.
The organizations expect the CAST program to generate what they describe as the world’s largest clinically annotated single-cell dataset in TNBC. Such a dataset could provide an important resource for evaluating the relationship between tumor cellular characteristics, treatment response and patient outcomes.
Four Key Areas of Development
The €3.3 million France 2030 funding will support four major areas of work during the four-year CAST project.
The first is the industrialization of the OneMap™ platform. Moving a technology from research use into clinical diagnostics requires the development of standardized, reproducible and scalable processes. The project will therefore focus on transforming the underlying technology into a platform capable of supporting broader clinical deployment.
The second area is the validation of predictive biomarkers in TNBC. Biomarkers identified through early research will need to be evaluated in clinically relevant patient populations to determine whether they can reliably help predict treatment response or resistance.
The third focus is regulatory preparation. As One Biosciences seeks to commercialize OneMap™ as an in vitro diagnostic test, the company will need to prepare for the applicable regulatory requirements governing clinical diagnostic products.
The fourth area involves scaling One Biosciences’ centralized clinical laboratory infrastructure in the Paris region. Expanding laboratory capabilities will be important for supporting future commercial deployment and processing clinical samples at the scale required for routine use.
Together, these activities are intended to create a pathway from scientific discovery to a commercially deployable diagnostic platform.
Potential to Improve Treatment Decisions
The CAST project is ultimately focused on helping physicians make more informed treatment decisions for patients with aggressive breast cancer.
For patients who are likely to respond well to therapy, better predictive information could potentially support treatment optimization and, in appropriate circumstances, help physicians consider whether treatment intensity can be reduced. Avoiding unnecessary treatment could reduce exposure to adverse effects while maintaining therapeutic benefit.
For patients who are unlikely to respond to an initial treatment strategy, earlier identification of resistance could potentially help clinicians consider alternative or salvage treatments more effectively.
This concept is particularly relevant in TNBC because treatment response can vary considerably among patients. A more detailed understanding of tumor biology could help move treatment selection beyond population-level averages and toward more individualized approaches.
However, the clinical utility of any predictive biomarker must be established through rigorous validation. The CAST project is therefore intended not only to generate biological insights but also to establish whether those insights can reliably translate into actionable clinical information.
Leadership Highlights Clinical Potential
Hedi Ben Brahim, CEO of One Biosciences, described the France 2030 funding as a significant milestone for the company and for the broader effort to bring single-cell technology into clinical care.
He said the CAST program is intended to accelerate the transition from scientific research to a scalable commercial product capable of supporting oncologists in treatment decision-making. Ben Brahim also expressed appreciation for France 2030 and its support for the initiative.
Dr. Céline Vallot, Co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of One Biosciences, CNRS Research Director and head of the Dynamics of Epigenetic Plasticity in Cancer team at Institut Curie, emphasized the connection between the CAST program and Institut Curie’s mission of translating advanced research into benefits for patients.
According to Vallot, bringing single-cell technologies into clinical practice could contribute to improved treatment strategies for aggressive cancers by providing a more detailed understanding of the biological characteristics of individual tumors. The approach is intended to support the broader goal of matching patients with treatments that are better suited to the unique biology of their disease.
Clinical Perspective on TNBC
Dr. Luc Cabel, medical oncologist at Institut Curie and Principal Investigator of the CAST project, highlighted the continuing challenge of predicting treatment response in TNBC.
He noted that clinicians need better tools both to identify patients who respond well to treatment and to determine alternative strategies for those who do not. From a clinical perspective, improved predictive information could help reduce unnecessary treatment-related toxicity for good responders while enabling physicians to make better-informed decisions regarding subsequent treatment for patients with resistant disease.
Cabel said the combination of clinical expertise, single-cell analysis and artificial intelligence could provide oncologists with a more precise understanding of the biology of individual tumors.
Advancing Precision Oncology
The CAST project reflects a broader movement toward increasingly detailed molecular characterization in precision oncology. As cancer research moves beyond identifying broad disease categories toward understanding the diverse cell populations within individual tumors, technologies capable of analyzing that complexity may become increasingly important.
Single-cell approaches can provide information that is difficult to obtain through conventional bulk analysis because they preserve information about individual cells and their molecular characteristics. When combined with artificial intelligence, large datasets generated through single-cell profiling can potentially be analyzed to identify patterns associated with treatment response, resistance and disease behavior.
For One Biosciences and Institut Curie, the immediate objective is to apply this approach to TNBC and establish a clinically useful diagnostic platform. The €3.3 million France 2030 investment provides resources to support technology industrialization, biomarker validation, regulatory preparation and laboratory expansion.
If successful, the CAST program could represent an important step toward integrating single-cell tumor profiling into routine cancer care. By providing clinicians with information about tumor heterogeneity and potentially treatment-relevant cellular signatures, OneMap™ could contribute to a more individualized approach to cancer treatment.
The project also illustrates the potential value of collaboration between biotechnology companies and academic cancer centers. One Biosciences brings its technology platform and commercialization capabilities, while Institut Curie contributes clinical expertise, research capabilities and access to a substantial patient cohort.
As the four-year CAST program progresses, the partners will work to validate the technology and prepare it for regulatory and commercial deployment. The broader ambition is to help close the gap between advanced cancer research and practical clinical decision-making, bringing single-cell precision oncology closer to everyday patient care.
About Institut Curie
Institut Curie, the leading French center for the fight against cancer, combines an internationally renowned research center and a state-of-the-art hospital that provides treatment for all cancers, including the rarest ones. Founded in 1909 by Marie Curie, Institut Curie employs 4,000 researchers, physicians, and health professionals across three sites (Paris, Saint-Cloud, and Orsay), all of whom contribute to its three missions of treatment, teaching and research. As a public-interest foundation authorized to receive donations and bequests, Institut Curie relies on donor support to accelerate scientific discovery and improve treatments and quality of life for patients.
To learn more: curie.fr ; LinkedIn, Facebook,Instagram,Bluesky
About One Biosciences
One Biosciences is a single-cell transcriptomics company pioneering clinical-grade tumor profiling solutions. Founded in 2020 as a spin-off from Institut Curie, the company is developing OneMap™, an end-to-end single-cell molecular profiling platform designed to help clinicians select optimal treatments for cancer patients and support pharmaceutical companies in the development of precision therapies and companion diagnostics. One Biosciences is supported by leading investors and partners including Redmile Group, Blast, Sofinnova Partners, Institut Curie, Gustave Roussy, and the Paris Saclay Cancer Cluster.
For more information, visit: onebiosciences.fr