NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Transposagen Biopharmaceuticals, a privately held firm making animal models of human disease for research purposes, today said that it has been approved for a $325,000 forgivable loan from the Kentucky High-Tech Investment Pool.
Lexington, Ky.-based Transposagen said that it will use the funding to purchase lab equipment and to “obtain protection” for its intellectual property.
The firm’s initial products are the MutaRat Knockout Rat Models, which have single-gene disruptions that mimic human disease and are used for drug research and development. Transposagen said that its technology is based on mobile DNA elements, which it uses to generate lab animals with an accelerated rate of random gene mutations in germ cells.
Transposagen CEO Eric Ostertag said that the firm expects the award will help it in hiring 13 full-time employees for high-tech and technical support jobs by the end of 2012.
The Kentucky High-Tech Investment Pool is administered by the state’s Cabinet for Economic Development’s department of Commercialization and Innovation.