Azenta, Inc. (Nasdaq: AZTA)  announced it has been selected by the Lupus Research Alliance and its clinical research affiliate Lupus Therapeutics to support the development of the patient registry component of the Lupus Nexus, which aims to advance and accelerate lupus research and drug discovery through information exchange capabilities. Azenta will serve as the exclusive sample management services provider including collection kit design, lab services, logistics, and biorepository storage for this transformational project.

The Lupus Nexus is a state-of-the-art, patient-centric, collaborative research resource for lupus that will be a source of highly curated clinical data, patient reported data, biological samples, and raw analyzed data. Azenta will support the collection, annotation, and storage of prospective and longitudinal study specimens. These specimens will be collected through the Lupus Landmark Study, the largest prospective observational study in lupus to date, aimed to prospectively recruit and longitudinally follow 3,500 adults diagnosed with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). Recruitment in the study is set to start in 2023 and will be conducted through Lupus Therapeutics' Lupus Clinical Investigators Network sites.

"Azenta is proud to partner with the Lupus Research Alliance to support the development of Lupus Nexus and to provide means to store biospecimens and data to further ongoing and future research on systemic lupus erythematosus," stated Kathi Shea, Vice President, Repository and Innovation at Azenta. "This ambitious, collaborative initiative set out by the Lupus Research Alliance and Lupus Therapeutics has the potential to transform lupus patient care and we are honored to have such a pivotal role in the project."