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Myalgic Encephalomyelitis / Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME / CFS) Post Treatment Lyme Disease Syndrome (PTLDS), Fibromyalgia Leading Research. Delivering Hope.Open Medicine Foundation® Canada
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Large-Scale Biomarker Project (BioQuest)

Study Aim

Identify a biochemical signature for ME/CFS that can be conveniently evaluated through a blood test.

Investigators

  • Jonas Bergquist, MD, PhD
  • Danielle Meadows, PhD

Updates and Potential

  • We have received approval to incorporate plasma samples collected via the Chronic Fatigue Initiative in our study.
  • We expect to begin testing samples by the end of 2025.
STUDY HYPOTHESIS AND DESCRIPTION

The absence of a molecular test for ME/CFS is a widely acknowledged challenge to healthcare providers and burden to patients. Currently, diagnosis relies on clinical features that are imprecisely defined, often subjective, overlap substantially with other disorders, and often require referral to a limited number of specialist centers. An ideal test will measure objective biochemical signals (biomarkers) that can be easily sampled in a primary care setting, such as serum or plasma obtained from a simple blood draw.

Various biomarker signatures have been proposed for ME/CFS, but they often lack independent validation, rely on small sample sizes, require specialized techniques (such as multi-color flow cytometry or single-cell Raman spectroscopy), use hard to access biological samples (such as cerebrospinal fluid), or compare between patients and healthy people rather than clinically relevant controls. Therefore, it remains a pressing need to identify new signatures that are robustly validated and readily translatable into the clinic.

OBJECTIVES

Bioquest: ME/CFS Biomarker Study on a blue medical background

  • Conduct large-scale biosample testing, including proteomics, metabolomics / lipidomics, cytokines, and immunoassays.
  • Combine biosample testing with clinical and pathology labs and demographic information.
  • Utilize bioinformatics and AI techniques to identify a signature of approx. 5-20 protein and/or metabolite biomarkers unique to ME/CFS.
  • Incorporate classification of subtypes of ME/CFS with biomarkers specific to those subtypes.

Consent management

Consent Preferences

Data Subject Access Request (DSAR) Form 

Microvesicles and viral sequencing
Microvesicles are a type of extracellular vesicle that is released from the cell membrane. Vesicles are small, fluid-filled sacs or vacuoles within the body. Sequencing is a technique used to determine the exact sequence of bases (A, C, G, and T) in a DNA (or viral) molecule.
NMR Metabolomics
NMR (Nuclear Magnetic Resonance) is an instrument/tool used to perform metabolic studies, metabolic profiling, and metabolomics in biofluids and tissues for more than 40 years using magnetic fields. There is a very close connection between metabolic measurements and NMR. This connection has flourished because of NMR’s many unique strengths for characterizing complex mixtures’ chemical composition.
Proteomics
The large-scale study of proteins, which are large, complex molecules that are required for structure, function, and regulation of the human body's tissues and organs.
Autoantibodies
Antibodies that react with self-molecules and that occur in healthy individuals and are referred to as natural antibodies or autoantibodies.
Extracellular DNA for viral reactivation and Mitochondrial DNA
exDNA (extracellular DNA), exDNA is often secreted actively and is used to perform several tasks, thereby offering an attractive target or tool for biotechnological, medical, environmental, and general microbiological applications. Viruses are intracellular parasites that rely to a significant extent on the host cell for replication. Viral reactivation occurs when an active replication of the viral genome results in a lytic (degradation of the cell) infection characterized by the release of new progeny (descendant) virus particles.
Immune cell profiling
The immune system has many important regulatory roles in disease development and progression. Given the emergence of effective immune therapies, reliable predictors of response are needed. Immune cell profiling determines response by evaluating immune cell populations from treated and untreated samples. For our purposes, we will evaluate the white blood cell response to the viral infection using a process called “Cytof.”
Leukocyte Genomics
A leukocyte is a colorless cell circulating in the blood and body fluids and is involved in counteracting foreign substances and disease. A genome is all genetic material of an organism. Genomics is a biology field focusing on the structure, function, evolution, mapping, and editing of genomes. Therefore, leukocyte genomics is the study of all genetic material of leukocytes.
Metabolomics
Metabolomics is a way to study metabolism – that is, through measuring amounts of the metabolites (small molecules) produced by our bodies as we convert food into energy and other molecules that our cells need to survive. Metabolomics technology is ‘large-scale,’ meaning that several thousand metabolites can be measured from a single sample of e.g., blood or urine.
Micro RNA
Cells use Micro RNA to control whether a particular gene is making too much, too little or the normal amount of its protein at a particular time.