Crohn’s disease, a chronic form of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), affects millions worldwide and often requires invasive procedures like endoscopy and colonoscopy to assess disease activity. Monitoring inflammation in the gut has traditionally been challenging, time-consuming, and burdensome for patients. A new study from Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) offers hope: researchers have shown that CXCL9, a cytokine (immune cell signaling molecule) measurable in blood, may serve as a promising noninvasive marker of active Crohn’s disease.
Published online March 9 2026, and led by senior author Lori Coburn, MD, associate professor of Medicine in VUMC’s Division of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, the study demonstrates that elevated serum CXCL9 levels can distinguish active from inactive disease across both endoscopic and histologic assessments. This finding could transform how clinicians and researchers monitor Crohn’s, reducing reliance on invasive procedures and low-adherence stool testing, while enabling more frequent, patient-friendly disease tracking.
The VUMC Study: CXCL9 Emerges as a Biomarker
The VUMC team measured multiple cytokines in blood serum samples from 103 patients with Crohn’s disease and 40 non-IBD controls who were undergoing colonoscopy. Disease activity was assessed using three complementary approaches:
- Clinical: Crohn’s Disease Activity Index (CDAI)
- Endoscopic: Simple Endoscopic Score for Crohn’s Disease (SES-CD)
- Histologic: Evaluation of colonoscopic biopsies
Multiple cytokines were significantly altered in patients with active versus inactive Crohn’s disease compared to controls by at least one measure. However, CXCL9 stood out: it was significantly elevated in active disease across both endoscopic and histologic evaluations and showed the highest discriminatory capacity between active and inactive states.
Why Noninvasive Cytokine Markers Matter for Crohn’s Drug Development
Current standards for assessing Crohn’s activity rely heavily on invasive procedures, which limit frequent monitoring, increase patient burden, and slow clinical trials. While there are stool tests to assess inflammation, noninvasive blood-based biomarkers, potentially including CXCL9, would address these pain points:
- Improved patient experience
Blood draws are simple, repeatable, and far less invasive. - Real-time disease tracking
Enables more dynamic assessment of treatment response. - Trial efficiency
Supports better endpoint selection, patient stratification, and evidence generation for regulatory submissions.
NashBio’s Prospective Plasma Collection: Turning Discovery into Actionable Research
NashBio’s strength lies in bridging cutting-edge academic research – like the VUMC CXCL9 study – with scalable, client-driven solutions for biospecimens and RWD. While VUMC’s BioVU biorepository provides one of the world’s largest de-identified EMR-linked biospecimen resources, we also offer prospective biospecimen collection to support forward-looking studies exactly like this one.
Specifically:
- Prospective plasma samples are available for collection from purple-top (EDTA-preserved) tubes, which can be used to generate proteomic data—including targeted cytokine panels for cohorts of interest. (Source)
- Seamlessly link these samples to rich, longitudinal clinical phenotypes from VUMC’s electronic health records, creating multimodal datasets that include clinical, genomic, imaging, and waveform data.
- Access these resources directly through our self-service platform for maximum flexibility and compliance.
- Integrate findings with real-world evidence from BioVU for deeper insights into disease progression, treatment response, and the patient journey.
Our expert analytics services and AI-driven technologies further enhance this offering. Clients receive not just raw data but curated, validated datasets ready for advanced association studies, cohort feasibility assessments, and regulatory-grade evidence packages.
Partner with NashBio to Advance IBD Research
At NashBio, we’re proud to offer the infrastructure to help turn such discoveries into scalable biopharma solutions. Our team is ready to support your needs with regulatory-grade data and collaborative expertise.
NashBio has a proven track record of delivering high-impact insights for biopharma, building on BioVU, a trusted resource with 700+ peer reviewed scientific publications.
Contact us today. Smarter data—and smarter research—is in our DNA.
References
- Vanderbilt University Medical Center News. (2026, April 2). Study identifies potential noninvasive blood marker for Crohn’s disease activity.
- Nature.com (2026, March 9). Non-invasive determination of disease activity in Crohn’s disease by serum luminex profiling.
- NashBio. Biosamples.
