NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) — Bio-Techne announced that it has acquired single-cell western blotting firm Zephyrus Biosciences. The company will be integrated into Bio-Techne's protein platforms division, which includes its ProteinSimple western blot product line.
A spinout from the lab of University of California, Berkeley researcher and company co-founder Amy Herr, Zephyrus launched in 2014 with $1.86 million in funding. The firm's technology uses microscope slides coated with a thin layer of photoactive polyacrylamide gel divided into microwells that are then seeded with the cells of interest. The cells are then lysed and separated via electrophoresis, allowing antibodies to probe the proteins at a single-cell level.
"The acquisition of Zephyrus demonstrates our continued interest in western blotting, a vital technique in protein identification and characterization," Bio-Techne President and CEO Charles Kummeth said in a statement. "This new technology brings this technique to the single cell level, allowing us to address both homogenous sample populations with our Simple Western platforms and now heterogeneous populations at the single cell level with Zephyrus and the Z1 System."
Zephyrus employees, including Co-founder and CEO Kelly Gardner, will remain with the company following the acquisition.
Further terms of the deal were not disclosed.