Hunting better biomarkers, J&J taps Celsius to unpack role played by single cells

"There's no obvious mutation you can point to in a patient who has inflammatory bowel disease that's driving their disease," said Tariq Kassum, CEO of Celsius Therapeutics, a Cambridge, Massachusetts-based biotech launched last year with $65 million in Series A funding.

The search for a better way to identify biomarkers in inflammatory disease led Johnson & Johnson's Janssen unit to partner with Celsius, which specializes in single-cell RNA sequencing.