ICT workshop on chromatographic separation technology
Chromatographic separation technology has become an almost indispensable technology to achieve required product purities. It requires specific expertise alongside suitable material and precise equipment. Judicious choice of chromatographic media, equipment and operation protocol require knowledge of both engineering and biological aspects of the particular separation at hand.

To develop the expertise in the area of chromatographic separations in the Indian biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, the Chemical Engineering Division of the Institute of Chemical Technology (ICT), Mumbai (formerly UDCT) organized a two-day national workshop on December 13-14. The workshop was organized under the aegis of the Bio-Rad-ICT Initiative, a project sponsored by Bio-Rad Laboratories with ICT for development of the science and engineering behind chromatographic and adsorptive separations.

Bio-Rad has invested Rs 80 lakh in this initiative at ICT for a period of three years. Of the total amount, Rs 50 lakh has already been utilized for setting up a facility with the state-of-art equipment that will support all the requirements. It is also supporting ICT with two full time research assistants/fellows who will work under Dr Arvind Lali, Reader, chemical engineering, ICT, for providing on site and off site support.

Besides developing the science and engineering, the initiative was aimed at providing an equipped laboratory facility where development work can be carried out to assist the industry in their separation problems and develop applications like purification of enzymes, proteins, hormones, nutraceuticals, etc. in high yield at low cost. The initiative also supports the companies that are actively involved into chromatography or planning to use chromatography as a purification step for their bio molecules at lab scale or pilot plant. They can not only get help in their upstream/ downstream processes but also avail the method development support.

DATATRAK, SAS to provide tech solutions for clinical trials
DATATRAK International, Inc., the Application Service Provider (ASP) in the Electronic Data Capture (EDC) industry, and SAS, the solution provider in business intelligence, will provide a joint offering to give life sciences customers unprecedented access, efficiency and speed in obtaining analysis-ready data from information collected in clinical trials. Available initially for clients in the US, this joint offering will be branded as DATATRAK Aware – Powered by SAS to emphasize the timeliness and importance of data awareness in the clinical trials process and underscore the importance of patient safety.

The business model for the Aware offering will involve DATATRAK and SAS jointly selling the linked capabilities between EDC and analysis-ready SAS data sets to life sciences customers. The agreement provides that DATATRAK will charge an incremental fee to clients selecting the efficiency and speed of the Aware option. Additionally, DATATRAK may make its EDC product and services offering available to SAS customers that have purchased SAS Drug Development separately.

PerkinElmer, Procognia to offer breakthrough protein array platform
PerkinElmer Inc. and Procognia, a developer of innovative and transformational technologies in the field of proteomics, announced an exclusive distribution and co-marketing agreement to deliver the only complete solution for high-throughput and high-resolution analysis of the glycosylation of proteins. Procognia's U-c fingerprint lectin array-based platform is being combined with PerkinElmer's advanced instrumentation, the Protein Array Workstation and the recently introduced ProScanArray HT, to offer the industry's first high-throughput, high-resolution glycoanalysis capability. Certain scientific estimates indicate that more than 60 percent of critical biological functions involve glycosylated proteins. This new technology will drive significant advancements in the understanding of protein function and structure.

U-c fingerprint technology requires no sample purification or pretreatment, and allows the quantitative analysis of 20 samples in approximately three hours. In addition, glycosylation analysis will bring biopharmaceutical companies closer to satisfying the FDA's PAT (Process Analytical Technology) initiative.

Pall acquires chromatography business from Ciphergen
Pall Corporation has completed the acquisition of the BioSepra Process Division from Ciphergen Biosystems, Inc. The purchase price was $32 million, net of cash and debt. The BioSepra Process Division develops, manufactures and markets chromatography sorbents that greatly simplify protein purification for drug development and production.

Eric Krasnoff, Chairman and CEO of Pall Corporation, said, "The addition of this innovative, broad range of chromatography chemistries strengthens our ability to serve the needs of biotechnology customers. The marriage of BioSepra's capabilities and Pall's extensive existing product portfolio allows customers to benefit from a highly integrated 'Total Fluid Management' approach."

Pall plans to establish additional Process Proteomics Service Centers to assist customers in selecting and optimizing sorbents and membranes for the purification of proteins used in the production of therapeutic proteins and other bioprocess applications. Pall and Ciphergen have also entered into a collaboration for process proteomics, based on the combination of Ciphergen's ProteinChip® technology and BioSepra's leading chromatography products.

Applied Biosystems launches new gene detection system
Applied Biosystems, an Applera Corporation business, announced the commercial availability of the Rat Genome Survey Microarray for use with its Expression Array System, the most comprehensive system for gene expression analysis when compared to other commercial microarrays.

Based on a combination of the public and Celera Genomics databases, computational annotation, and manual curation, the Applied Biosystems Rat Genome Survey Microarray contains 26,857 probes for the interrogation of 27,088 genes covering 43,508 rat transcripts. This microarray includes more than 10,000 genes not covered by other commercial microarrays. "Toxicology screening using the rat model has become essential to the process of bringing new drugs to market," said Catherine M Burzik, president of Applied Biosystems. "The new Rat Genome Survey Microarray complements our recently released Mouse Genome Survey Array, offering researchers comprehensive genomic coverage for these important model organisms."

The Applied Biosystems Expression Array System is part of an integrated workflow solution for gene expression analysis. The system enables researchers to easily move from whole-genome analysis to gene validation, quantification, and functional analysis by using the Expression Array System in conjunction with the Applied Biosystems TaqMan Rat Gene Expression Assays, TaqMan Low Density Array, and real-time PCR systems.

Agilent introduces 32-bit ChemStation analytical lab software
Agilent Technologies Inc. has introduced a 32-bit version of its ChemStation, its software for instrument control and data acquisition and management in the analytical laboratory. The conversion to 32-bit architecture improves the software's performance and stability, especially when running with other 32-bit programs such as antivirus software.

The new software supports the Agilent 1100 Series and 1090 liquid chromatographs; 6890, 6850 and 5890 gas chromatographs; 1100 Series mass selective detectors; the 35900E analog-to-digital converter; the G1888 headspace sampler; and the 7683B automatic liquid sampler.

Agilent has also released revision B.03.02 of its ChemStore and ChemStation Plus Security Pack add-on software modules to provide support for the 32-bit ChemStation. These add-on software modules provide easy organization, review, approval and storage of analytical data, and support for compliance with regulatory requirements such as US FDA 21 CFR Part 11.

The ChemStation revision B.01.01 and ChemStore revision B.03.02 are compatible with Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional Service Pack 4 and Windows XP Professional Service Pack 1A. The ChemStore Server revision B.03.02 software is compatible with Microsoft Windows 2000 Server, Service Pack 4.

Sartorius receives Frost & Sullivan Award
Sartorius AG, the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supplier, received the "Product Differentiation Innovation Award 2004" from Frost & Sullivan, the international consulting company. Frost & Sullivan commends Sartorius for its innovative business model in the Biotechnology Division.

The consulting firm observed that it selected Sartorius for the following reasons; during the past years, Sartorius has systematically built up a truly comprehensive product range for customers in the biopharmaceutical industry through its own innovative developments and services as well as through acquisitions and strategic alliances. Early on, Sartorius recognized the need to provide the biopharmaceutical industry with an integrated portfolio of process technology products, and evolved from a filtration specialist into a global provider of complete process solutions. Particularly impressive have been Sartorius' developments of new technologies for downstream processing and for purification of monoclonal antibodies and human vaccines, among others. " This award is not only a great honor for us, but also confirms the strategy of our Biotechnology Division and the innovative capability of Sartorius," said Reinhard Vogt, senior vice president of the bioprocess business area in the biotechnology division at Sartorius AG.

Cambrex provides Novartis Taste Masking System
Cambrex, a life sciences company, is providing a proprietary taste masking system to Novartis Consumer Health, Inc. for a range of market leading over-the-counter (OTC) products. The Cambrex proprietary system masks the negative taste associated with the active pharmaceutical ingredients in these products.

"We are very proud to partner with Novartis Consumer Health to create and provide an enabling taste masking system. Novartis is providing emerging drug delivery systems and packaging solutions to the market," commented Gary L. Mossman, Cambrex Chief Operating Officer.

The Cambrex system uses technology that masks the unpleasant taste of many active pharmaceutical ingredients in other drug delivery systems without the use of sugar. Patients, particularly children and the elderly, who are unable to use traditional dosing methods like hard-to-swallow tablets, can benefit from alternative drug delivery technologies using taste masking.

Cellomics, BD sign agreement to expand availability of HCS
Cellomics, Inc., the creator of High Content Screening (HCS), and global medical technology company BD (Becton, Dickinson and Company), through its BD Biosciences unit, announced that they have entered into a non-exclusive, worldwide patent license agreement. The agreement will provide BD with Cellomics' core High Content Screening patent portfolio that includes both broad claims to HCS technology and specific classes of HCS assays such as cytoplasm-nuclear translocation, characterization of cellular toxicity, and receptor internalization. Financial details of the agreement were not disclosed.

"We are pleased to be working with BD to further expand the adoption and availability of high content screening technology. Through licensing of our HCS patent portfolio, we are seeking to enable customers to more effectively address complex biological questions," commented William T. Sharp, vie president, business development, Cellomics. "With the recent acquisition of Atto Bioscience, and our licensing of this intellectual property from Cellomics, BD Biosciences extends our commitment to the area of high-content cellular analysis and strengthens our considerable capabilities in the area of live cell research that include high-resolution imaging, flow cytometry and a broad array of reagent systems," added Mark Lewis, Vice President of BD Biosciences.

"Completion of this second significant licensing arrangement of our HCS patent portfolio with a global company like BD confirms the value of our extensive intellectual property in this critical area of drug discovery and reaffirms our intent to facilitate the expansion of the HCS market ," stated Daniel J. Calvo, Cellomics' President and CEO.

Accelrys launches Nanotechnology consortium
Accelrys Inc. launched the Accelrys Nanotechnology Consortium. The goal of the Nanotech Consortium is to accelerate the development of software tools that enable the design of nanomaterials and nanodevices. The Consortium provides a project framework and a detailed scientific proposal that addresses the challenges of rational nanomaterials and nanodevice design.

Members of the Nanotechnology Consortium include industrial researchers, academic experts, and Accelrys scientists, who are focused on developing, validating, and applying simulation to a particular research area. Members receive software, the right to provide formal input into Accelrys product plans, access to regular meetings at which experiences and ideas are shared, and dedicated application support. The Consortium also offers early access to cutting edge technology.

The consortium kicks off with a who's who list of members, partners and advisors. Charter members include Corning Incorporated, Fujitsu, e2v Technologies, Imperial College, London, and Uppsala University, Sweden.

"Close partnership and collaboration with industry is essential for Accelrys to develop software and services that help solve critical research problems," said Mark J Emkjer, president and CEO of Accelrys. "This latest initiative is an extension of the successful Accelrys Consortium model, which has in the past delivered important advancements in areas such as catalysis and combinatorial chemistry."

"Consortiums bring industries together and provide the opportunity to drive solutions into the market," said David Morse, VP of Research & Development at Corning Inc.

Bio-Rad agrees to sell Senior Subordinated Notes in private offering
Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc., a manufacturer and distributor of life science research products and clinical diagnostics, announced that it has agreed to sell $200 million aggregate principal amount of its 6 1/8% Senior Subordinated Notes due 2014 in a private offering. It intends to use the proceeds for working capital and general corporate purposes, which may include acquisitions.

According to an official press release, the new Senior Subordinated Notes have not been registered under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or applicable state securities laws, and will be offered only to qualified institutional buyers in reliance on Rule 144A and in offshore transactions pursuant to Regulation S under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended. Unless so registered, the new Senior Subordinated Notes may not be offered or sold in the United States except pursuant to an exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act and applicable state securities laws.