So far, biopsy has been the technology for diagnosis of fibrosis in patients. It has its limitation, and many times it fails to provide critical information about the severity of the disease to the pathologists.

Dr Dean Tai and Dr Gideon Ho founded HistoIndex, a spin-off company from Singapore's Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) in 2010, to bring a revolutionary platform for the diagnosis of fibrosis to the market.

HistoIndex was formed to commercialize a proprietary photonic technology developed in the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology. For four years before the company was formed, the technology was validated first in animals and subsequently in humans.

HistoIndex has created new standards of diagnosis for fibrosis and cancer. Initially, it focused on liver and kidney tissues to automatically and accurately identify the disease and is now expanding its applications to include other tissues such as lung, skin, heart and cervix.

"HistoIndex is the first in the world to provide stain-free, three dimensional, quantitative imaging solutions for visualizing and staging fibrosis. This provides critical information that is not available to pathologists using existing stain-based imaging techniques. The laser-based imaging system, Genesis, is currently installed in our trial site hospitals and research labs," says Dr Giedon Ho, chief commercial officer, HistoIndex.