Biotech company Alchemab said on Wednesday that it has signed a partnership with AstraZeneca (Nasdaq:AZN) to accelerate prostate cancer research under a proof-of-concept study to build understanding of the fundamental biology of prostate cancer.

The terms of the agreement allows Alchemab's novel drug discovery platform to be used as a diagnostic tool through the identification of disease biomarkers with potential to inform the development of novel antibody-based therapeutics.

Based on cutting-edge advanced analytics and functional validation methods, Alchemab will sequence and explore antibody repertoires within patient samples from a clinical trial of a novel immuno-oncology agent in the AstraZeneca pipeline.

Under the partnership, the companies plans to define antibody signatures for predicting how well a patient may respond to therapy as well as to improve the understanding of the underlying immune profile of prostate cancer patients. The collaboration aims to identify novel, disease-relevant antibodies which may yield therapeutic insights into currently unknown disease biology including direct biotherapeutic development of a protective antibody or enable drug discovery against a novel disease target.

Identifying patients as responders or non-responders, Alchemab may identify antibody sequence patterns that could function as biomarkers for early detection and patient stratification, enabling researchers to predict and monitor responses to novel immuno-oncology agents.