Invitrogen this week announced a pair of agreements involving human embryonic stem cells aimed at bolstering the company's already strong play in the stem cell research market.

On Tuesday, Invitrogen said that it had entered into a collaboration with Swedish biotech Cellartis to jointly develop engineered hESC reporter lines. Two days later, Invitrogen struck a deal to license intellectual property from Geron related to techniques for large-scale growth of hESCs.