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Agilent Announces Deals in South Korea for Clinical Assay Development, Neurometabolomic Research

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Agilent Technologies separately announced on Thursday a collaboration with Samsung Medical Center and the creation of a new center for neurometabolomics in South Korea.

Under the terms of the deal with Samsung, the Department of Laboratory Medicine & Genetics Research in Seoul, South Korea — part of the Center for Future Medicine at Samsung Medical Center — will use bio-analytical instruments from Agilent for the analysis of clinical samples and to develop novel clinical assays.

Instruments covered by the deal include the Agilent 6530 Accurate-Mass Q-TOF LC/MS platform and the 6430 Triple Quadrupole LC/MS system.

Sung-Hwa Hong, executive vice president of R&D at Samsung Medical Center, said in a statement that under a memorandum of understanding with Agilent, the partners will collaborate on the discovery and validation of protein biomarkers for applications in clinical trials; the development of methodology for applications involving hormones and vitamins; and the development of an assay for tumor markers for certain cancers and diseases.

Rudolf Grimm, Agilent's collaborations manager for South Korea and the South Asia Pacific region, added that researchers from Samsung and Agilent plan to collaborate on joint research projects to evaluate novel and "powerful" analytical technologies for future use in clinical environments.

Separately, Agilent said it has established a center for neurometabolomics R&D in Daegu, which will serve as the base for Agilent's collaborative work with the department of brain science at the Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST).

The deal is the firm's first collaboration in Asia for metabolomics research in brain science, it said.

"The goal of this center is not only to lead global collaborations in neurometabolomics but to foster and train researchers who will work in this area," Eun-Kyoung Kim, a professor in the department of brain science at DGIST, said in a statement. Kim will soon be appointed head of the Neurometabolomics Research and Training Center, Agilent said.

According to an MOU, Agilent will provide DGIST with early access to new technologies and software development. The center will be a reference site for Agilent customers in Asia who are interested in metabolomics and brain science.

Financial and other terms for the two deals were not disclosed.

The announcements follow an announcement on Wednesday from Agilent that it is partnering with with South Korea's Gachon University of Medicine and Science to use proteomics and glycoproteomics for biomarker discovery.