Nov. 17, 2000--PE Biosystems Group (NYSE:PEB - news), a PE Corporation business now conducting business under the Applied Biosystems name, announced today that it had obtained an exclusive worldwide license to manufacture and commercialize ICAT(TM) reagents from the University of Washington.
The isotope coded affinity tag technology was invented by Ruedi Aebersold, Ph.D. of the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, while he was a professor at the University of Washington. The ICAT(TM) reagents and method are designed to offer researchers a powerful new process to prepare samples for analysis by mass spectrometry in order to identify and determine the relative expression levels of proteins. For example, they are intended to distinguish expression levels in healthy and diseased tissue samples.
``We view the ICAT(TM) reagent technology as an important addition to our proteomics portfolio,'' said Joseph E. Malandrakis, general manager of the PerSeptive Biosystems business unit of Applied Biosystems. ``This technology is intended to bring added benefits in terms of identifying and quantifying important low abundance and membrane proteins. The ICAT(TM) reagent chemistry is a platform technology that we expect to embody in a family of reagents and instrument systems over time.''
Applied Biosystems intends to begin commercial delivery of the first ICAT(TM) product in the first half of calendar year 2001.
``We are delighted that Applied Biosystems is our licensee for the ICAT(TM) reagents,'' Robert Miller, vice provost of Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer at the University of Washington. ``Their intention to rapidly commercialize the technology is an excellent example of technology transfer from a university-based invention to a viable state-of-the-art product.''
Applied Biosystems is developing new tools to modernize proteomics much as it pioneered new technology in the late `90s to enhance genomics. The group's Proteomics Research Center is leveraging Applied Biosystems' existing proteomics expertise and internal research capabilities while facilitating collaboration with complementary research and technology partners. The goal is to achieve breakthroughs in complete systems solutions resulting in orders of magnitude improvement in throughput and the production of high-quality information.... |
