Promega has been awarded US Patent No. 8,519,119, "Methods of purifying a nucleic acid formulation and kit for use in performing such methods."
Rex Bitner is named as inventor.
Describes a formulation containing guanidine thiocyanate or guanidine hydrochloride together with acetamide, one or more acetamide derivatives, or a combination of acetamide and one or more acetamide derivatives, with methods to use the formulation, to purify one or more nucleic acids contained in a medium.
Luminex has been awarded US Patent No. 8,519,117, "Materials and methods for detection of nucleic acids."
David Marshall, James Prudent, Christopher Sherrill, Gideon Shapiro, Jennifer Grenier, Craig Richmond, Simona Jurczyk, and Jerod Ptacin are named as inventors.
Describes assays using non-natural bases. In one embodiment, the method involves contacting a sample suspected of containing the target nucleic acid with a polymerase and first and second primers; amplifying the target nucleic acid by PCR using the primers to generate an amplification product having a double-stranded region and a single-stranded region that comprises the non-natural base; contacting the sample with a reporter comprising a label and a non-natural base that is complementary to the non-natural base of the single-stranded region; annealing at least a portion of the reporter to the single-stranded region of the amplification product; and correlating a signal of the label with the presence of the target nucleic acid in the sample. The invention also provides corresponding kits for use in detecting target nucleic acids in a sample.
Luminex has also been awarded US Patent No. 8.518,671, "Solid support assay systems and methods utilizing non-standard bases."
Jennifer Grenier, David Marshall, James Prudent, Craig Richmond, Eric Roesch, Christopher Scherrer, Christopher Sherrill, and Jerod Ptacin are named as inventors.
Describes solid support assays using non-standard bases. A capture oligonucleotide comprising a molecular recognition sequence is attached to a solid support and hybridized with a target. In some instances, the molecular recognition sequence includes one or more non-standard bases and hybridizes to a complementary tagging sequence of the target oligonucleotide. In other instances, incorporation of a non-standard base (e.g., via PCR or ligation) is used in the assay.
Life Technologies has been awarded US Patent No. 8,518,670, "Nucleic acid-free thermostable enzymes and methods of production thereof."
Adam Goldstein and John Hughes, Jr., are named as inventors.
Provides thermostable enzymes such as DNA polymerases and restriction endonucleases that are substantially free from contamination with nucleic acids. The patent also provides methods for the production of these enzymes, and kits comprising these enzymes, which may be used to amplify or sequence nucleic acid molecules, including through the use of PCR.
University College Cardiff Consultants of Cardiff, UK, has been awarded US Patent No. 8,518,641, "DNA damage testing."
Raymond Waters and Simon Reed are named as inventors.
Relates to a method of detecting DNA damage in a tissue sample. The method includes the steps of exposing sample DNA to a tagged DNA-damage binding factor and then shearing the DNA to produce fragments. After separating damaged from undamaged DNA, the two are amplified and differentially labeled. The labeled fragments can be immobilized on a microarray allowing the location and extent of any DNA damage to be determined.
Bio-Rad Innovations of Marnes-la-Coquette, France, has been awarded US Patent No. 8,518,639, "HPV detection and quantification by real-time multiplex amplification."
Stephane Rihet and Fatima Zeryouh are named as inventors.
Relates to amplification primers and detection probes that are useful for the detection of human papillomaviruses, and more particularly of HPV which can be oncogenic for the mucosal epithelia. The described amplification and detection systems are group-targeted systems, namely A5-, A6- A7-, and A9-targeted systems, and enable both multiplex and real-time amplification of HPV, whereby at least the thirteen high-risk HPV can be detected in a single-tube assay. The invention further enables reliable quantitation of HPV viral loads in real-time multiplex amplification.