QT Sense raises €4 million to develop quantum platform for cancer, sepsis and arthritis research
Groningen-based BioTech startup QT Sense has raised €4 million to accelerate Quantum Nuova, their platform that uses quantum technology to track cellular stress within individual cells in real time – enabling scientists to watch cellular processes as they happen.
The funding combines a €3 million Seed round led by Cottonwood Technology Fund, alongside follow-on funding from the startup’s existing VC investor, QDNL Participations, and an angel investor. In addition, they secured a €600k ONCO-Q grant and €400k through the Quantum Forward Challenge.
This follows 2025’s €6 million raise, as covered by EU-Startups.
QT Sense’s CEO, Dr Deepak Veeregowda says choosing Cottonwood was intentional – and critical: “Cottonwood backs real DeepTech. Their conviction in breakthrough hardware enables us to move fast and deliver Quantum Nuova to scientists and drug discovery researchers who need it. Quantum sensing reveals fundamental biochemical processes that were invisible until now – this is a scientific shift, not an incremental step. We’re building a platform that works every day in real labs, with scale, reliability, and seamless integration at its core.”
In the broader European quantum and DeepTech landscape, several peers have secured funding in 2025–2026 that help situate QT Sense’s Seed round within wider capital flows.
For example, YQuantum €160 k Seed for miniaturised quantum hardware in Switzerland illustrates sustained interest in quantum-hardware ventures at the early stage, while Equal1’s €51 million round to scale silicon‑based quantum semiconductors in Ireland underscores how European quantum startups are attracting significantly larger growth capital as they transition toward deployment.
In the quantum sensing and metrology domain, plans by QuantumDiamonds for a €152 million inspection facility investment in Munich show substantial industrial and infrastructure commitments relevant to sensing technologies.
Beyond quantum, activity across adjacent life science and DeepTech sectors is also notable: initiatives such as BioInnovation Institute’s €25 million support programme for early-stage biosolutions startups in Denmark reveal strategic backing for BioTech and DeepTech innovation in Europe.
Together, these developments reflect a mosaic of investment – from smaller Seed rounds to tens of millions in growth capital and large facility builds – highlighting that while QT Sense’s raise is modest in absolute terms, it aligns with an ecosystem where early-stage quantum and life science technologies are actively funded and poised for further scaling.
Alain le Loux, general partner at Cottonwood Technology Fund, said: “QT Sense is exactly the kind of hard science company we look for – deeply disruptive technology rooted in world-class research, with the potential to fundamentally change how we understand and treat disease. We are proud to lead this investment and support QT Sense in transforming quantum sensing from a lab breakthrough into a scalable, real-world platform for drug discovery. We are very pleased that Cottonwood is backed by the NOM and Innovatiefonds Groningen to support the Dutch BioTech ecosystem.”
Founded in 2024, QT Sense is dedicated to innovating biomedical research through the power of quantum mechanics. With a decade-long collaboration at the University Medical Center Groningen (UMCG), their team has conducted experimentation utilising diamond magnetometry and confocal microscopy on living organisms.
Building upon their research, QT Sense has developed Quantum Nouva, a diagnostic and research tool. Quantum Nouva is specifically designed to address the challenges posed by oxidative stress-induced health conditions such as cancer, male infertility, immune response disorders, sepsis, and arthritis.
While traditional methods study frozen tissue or dead cells, QT Sense’s Quantum Nuova platform measures real-time biochemical activity in living cells and tissues.
Using ultra-sensitive fluorescent nanodiamond quantum sensors, Quantum Nuova detects oxidative stress, metabolic shifts, and free radical kinetics – dynamic signals that drive disease but have remained invisible until now – with single-cell precision.
With this live view of cell behaviour, researchers can see how cells react to drugs, adapt to stress, and diverge into hidden subpopulations.
The technology has already been used to demonstrate the mechanism of action of FDA-approved drug compounds. With new ONCO-Q grant funding, it will now be applied to colorectal cancer.
Quantum Nuova will generate the first functional maps of oxidative stress and metabolic vulnerabilities in colorectal tumour models, laying the groundwork for new diagnostics and therapeutic strategies.
Ton van ‘t Noordende, general partner at QDNL Participations, says: “As the first investor in QT Sense, we have seen Quantum Nuova evolve from its beginnings as a bold idea at the intersection of quantum sensing and life sciences. Today’s round shows how quickly that vision is translating into a real discovery platform for oncology and drug development. With a team that perfectly blends scientific expertise with strategy execution, QT Sense is exactly the kind of foundational quantum company we aim to support early: world-class science, clear clinical and commercial pull, and the potential to redefine how biology is done in the lab.”
This Seed investment enables QT Sense to transform Quantum Nuova from a prototype into a ready-to-deploy discovery platform.
Improvements in hardware robustness, throughput, and integrated analytics will prepare the system for real-world use. Early-access units will soon be placed with strategic partners, enabling mechanism-of-action studies, functional heterogeneity profiling, and label-free readouts across many samples.
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