OHSU Opens Proteomics Core
The Oregon Health and Science University School of Medicine announced last week that it has opened a Proteomics Shared Resource at the school’s Portland-based campus.
The facility, which opened for business on Feb. 17, was funded by a grant from the Oregon Opportunity, a public-private $500 million biomedical research funding initiative. The core will initially provide services to the OHSU research community, including the OHSU Cancer Center.
Zeptosens Licenses Technology from CST
Zeptosens of Witterswil, Switzerland, announced this week that it has signed an agreement with Beverly, Mass.-based Cell Signaling Technology for the use of CST’s reagents in Zeptosens’ ZeptoMARK protein array platform. The reagents used will include phosphospecific antibodies to kinases and other signaling molecules, according to the companies.
Financial details of the agreement were not disclosed.
Incogen Gets $2M in Second NIH Grant for SELDI Analysis
Incogen said this week that it has received a $2 million Phase II grant from the National Cancer Institute to develop its cancer diagnostic software.
The company will work with the College of William and Mary and the Eastern Virginia Medical School on the project, Incogen said.
The two-year grant follows on a Phase I grant awarded to Incogen a year ago, which funded the development of a pilot project to analyze proteomics data produced by Ciphergen Biosystems’ SELDI platform. In the second phase of the project, Incogen hopes to develop a clinical diagnostic software package for distribution to clinical researchers. EVMS will produce the data for the project, while W&M and Incogen will analyze the data, the company said.
Ciphergen Supplies Japanese Drug Discovery Project
Ciphergen Biosystems announced this week that its Japanese subsidiary, Ciphergen Biosystems KK, has been named one of the official technology suppliers of the Japanese Drug Discovery Proteome Factory project.
Ciphergen has so far sold to the project three ProteinChip AutoBiomarker Systems and two ProteinChip interfaces for use with tandem mass spec, the company said.
The five-year Japanese project, which began in 2002, involves 20 Japanese pharma companies and is funded by the Japan Health Science Foundation to the tune of 4.5 billion yen ($41 million).
Proteome Systems Pens Two Collaborations
Proteome Systems of Sydney, Australia and the New York-based High Q Foundation announced this week that they will collaborate on biomarker discovery and molecular characterization for Huntington’s Disease. Proteome Systems also announced this week that it has begun a collaboration with Melbourne-based SGE International to jointly develop liquid chromatography kits for use with LC-MS proteomics experiments.
In the biomarker collaboration, Proteome Systems will look for changes in protein expression and modifications resulting from the malfunctioning of the Huntingtin protein. The company will then develop tests to monitor disease progression and measure outcomes of clinical trials, using its DiagnostlQ platform.
The company will also characterize the proteins involved in the disease to look for differences between wild-type and mutant Huntingtin proteins.
In the LC-MS collaboration, Proteome Systems will work with SGE’s capillary and nanoflow LC columns and tubing to create an interface for the LC systems with electrospray mass spec.
Bruker Reports Preliminary Q1 Results: Revenues at $68M to 69M
Bruker BioSciences reported this week that it expects between $68 million and $69 million in revenues and $.01 in earnings per share for the first quarter of 2004. Bruker plans to announce its full financial results for the first quarter on May 4.
Emory Scientists Find Central Nervous System Cancer Patterns in CSF
A group of Emory University scientists presented a study this week at the Experimental Biology 2004 meeting in which they used Ciphergen’s SELDI technology to find protein patterns in CSF that distinguished between patients with CNS diseases such as multiple sclerosis and stoke, and patients with CNS cancers.
The study, led by Emory scientists Savvas Mendrinos, Melinda Lewis, and Daniel Brat, analyzed samples from 30 patients — 10 with known malignant tumors, 12 with other CNS conditions that were not cancerous, and eight with no neuorologic disease. They found patterns that distinguished between cancerous and non-cancerous disease. Their next step will be to look for proteins specific to each disease category.