The 10-Q is not at EDGAR yet. Today's pop courtesy of a Forbes article that contained nothing new. Meanwhile . . .
>>Accelerating Patent Activities. Ciphergen filed 7 new patent
applications in the second quarter, more than in any previous quarter.
Many of these applications are directed to multiple biomarkers and
assays resulting from work with our research collaborators. Since the
beginning of 2002, Ciphergen has filed 12 new patent applications.<<
This phrase appeared in an August 19th, 2002 PR, but I could not find the applications they were talking about. It turns out they had been filed, but for the most part were not published until about a week ago. The referenced post notes one that was.
A batch of others from Canadian collaborators is now published. I cannot tell how direct their affiliation with CIPH is. A run of their names through PubMed shows they all seem to be associated with Canadian medical institutions, not directly with Ciphergen. The applications all have to do with Syndrome X related disease states. The markers are identified by molecular weight in daltons. I've put together a table of markers by molecular weight and the disease states they indicate:
1020 myocardial infarction
1998, 1097 Type II diabetes
1348, 1449 myocardial infarction, intracerebral hemorrhage, or congestive heart failure
1521, 1206 Renal Failure
2753, 2937, 2267 insulin resistance
1777, 2021, 1865 myocardial infarction, intracerebral hemorrhage, congestive heart failure or Type II diabetes
1896 myocardial infarction, Type II diabetes, and congestive heart failure
1465 renal failure or intracerebral hemorrhage
1525, 1536, 1077 myocardial infarction
1562 myocardial infarction or congestive heart failure
1350 myocardial infarction or renal failure
1424, 1793 congestive heart failure
1949 Syndrome X related disease
Ciphergen is not listed as the assignee on these, but the SELDI and ProteinChip are clearly identified as the means by which they are found. I believe this means that since the collaborators are not among those funded by CIPH, so they retain rights to the markers. CIPH can presumably license these if they so choose. I have seen no other work in this area, most of it has been in oncology. So I could see CIPH licensing these.
The above almost but doesn't quite seem to gibe with the language of the PR excerpt cited above. Might give someone at CIPH a holler and ask . . .
Cheers, Tuck |
