AI to help uncover blood doping – Swedish firm receives WADA grant

Christer Malm, founder of ProTest Diagnostics and Professor of Sports Medicine at Umeå University, Sweden.

ProTest Diagnostics, a Swedish biotech company, has secured a significant grant from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) to develop cutting-edge technology aimed at detecting one of sport’s hardest-to-spot cheating methods – blood doping.

ProTest Diagnostics, based in Umeå, has been awarded just over SEK 1.2 million (USD 131,000) to create a new test using artificial intelligence. The system will pre-sort blood cells to spot subtle changes that occur when blood is frozen and later transfused back into the body.

From near-launch to new beginnings
ProTest first made waves in the 2010s when, as part of the Umeå Biotech Incubator, it developed a test kit capable of detecting molecular changes in blood. Backed by investors Fort Knox and Nascent Invest, the product was on the brink of commercial release around 2019–2020, but validation hurdles stalled progress.

Now, the company is relaunching the project with upgraded technology and global partnerships. Alongside WADA’s funding, it has received support from TAIGA at Umeå University and the National Bioinformatics Infrastructure Sweden (NBIS) in Lund.

“Only four projects worldwide received funding in this round – and we were awarded the largest sum. WADA’s review describes us as world leaders in the field,” says Professor Christer Malm, founder of ProTest Diagnostics and Professor of Sports Medicine at the Department of Community Medicine and Rehabilitation at Umeå University.

Pinpointing rogue cells with AI
Over the next year, the firm will recruit two part-time specialists to extract and analyse data from blood samples. The AI system, trialled in partnership with a Japanese company that introduced the method in 2022, will act as a high-precision filter.

“We’ll use biological filtration to separate the blood, then apply AI to sort the cells. This gives us a better chance of finding the ones that show abnormalities,” explains Malm.

A two-decade quest
Malm’s pursuit of a foolproof blood doping test began in 2006, when he presented his early results to Arne Ljungqvist, then chair of the IOC’s Medical Commission. Nearly two decades on, he remains determined to crack the case.

“It’s probably the stubborn competitor in me – I believe the problem can be solved. I did my doctorate under Björn Ekblom, who proved back in the 1970s that blood doping works. Solving this would feel like closing the circle,” he says.

“We know the cells are damaged – we just haven’t pinpointed the common denominator. My goal is to solve that mystery while advancing biomarker research as a whole.”

About the WADA project

• Title: “Cryo-RBC blood doping: Enhanced biomarker detectability by AI-driven cell sorting and Biofiltration”
• Duration: 1 year
• Funding: USD 131,000
• Co-applicants: Lars Kaestner (Saarland University), Sigeeta Rajaram (ThinkCyte), André Görgens (Karolinska Institutet), Anders Mannelqvist (ProTest Diagnostics)

What is blood doping?

• Blood doping is the process of boosting athletic performance using one’s blood.
• Blood is collected in advance, frozen, and then transfused back before competition, increasing red blood cell count and oxygen-carrying capacity.
• The use of an athlete’s own blood makes the method extremely difficult to detect.

For more info, please contact: 
Christer Malm, founder, ProTest Diagnostics 
christer.malm@umu.se 
+46-(0)90-786 66 21