NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) — Phase Genomics said today that it has received a $200,000 grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop a computational platform for extracting genomic information from microbiome samples.
Seattle-based Phase offers research services and kits based on its Hi-C and proximity-ligation technologies, which enable chromosome-scale genome assembly, metagenomic deconvolution, and the analysis of structural genomic variation and genome architecture.
With the one-year grant, the company said it will develop a platform to identify species and strains of bacteria that cannot be cultured or detected with standard methods. Applications include the discovery of new gut microbes and the ways they colonize mother and child.
"By collaborating with Phase Genomics on the development of metagenomic proximity-ligation technology, we hope to increase our understanding of the microbes that impact human health, with a focus on understudied samples from the developing world," Stanford University researcher and Phase collaborator Justin Sonnenburg said in a statement. "Our goal is to produce a tool that will make the highest resolution microbiome analysis accessible to researchers around the globe."
In mid-2018, Phase was awarded a two-year, $1.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to develop an affordable, high-throughput Hi-C kit and computational analysis platform for microbiome research and discovery.