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Fluidigm, Visiopharm Ink Mass Cytometry Comarketing Pact

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – Fluidigm and Visiopharm have signed a comarketing agreement to automate image analysis for imaging mass cytometry, the companies said today.

Under the agreement, Fluidigm and Visiopharm will copromote Visiopharm's Phenomap image-analysis software alongside Fluidigm's Hyperion imaging system, MCD Viewer software, and related Maxpar antibodies and kits.

Fluidigm's Hyperion system, developed with the company's CyTOF technology, surpasses the inherent limitations of fluorescence detection by using high-purity metal tags that are separated by mass instead of wavelength. The system enables the detection of up to 37 markers from a single tissue section.

Meanwhile, Visiopharm's Phenomap software enables automated analysis of images generated by Hyperion. Offered by the company as a licensed software product, Phenomap provides automated cell segmentation, phenotyping of cell classes, and visualization of cell populations with phenotypic charting and t-SNE clustering.

"The collaboration between Fluidigm and Visiopharm will provide scientists novel tools to understand the biology of cancer, including the phenotyping of cells within the tumor microenvironment," Visiopharm CEO Michael Grunkin said in a statement. "Our complementary technologies provide an entirely new research approach to drive drug-diagnostic codevelopment on a tissue-based platform, with the potential to also provide a new framework for precision medicine in cancer."

Fluidigm President and CEO Chris Linthwaite added that the deal is an example of how Fluidigm is "committed to maximizing the full potential of mass cytometry to deeply interrogate tissue and tumor samples."