NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – TriLink BioTechnology said today it has received a $100,000 Phase I Small Business Innovation Research grant from the National Institutes of Health to develop a Hot Start approach for Ligase Chain Reaction.
With the grant, which lasts until July, the San Diego company will use chemically modified ligation components containing thermolabile protecting groups to eliminate problems often seen in LCR, including specificity issues and false-positive signals. The company hopes its approach will eventually lead to LCR replacing applications where traditional PCR, Gap-LCR, and PCR/ ligation combination approaches are too expensive, not applicable, or problematic, it said.
The grant is the fifth the company has received and follows a Phase II SBIR grant of $725,000 in June to continuing study DNA ligase.