BioTrove Announces New OpenArray Platform Application To Identify Pediatric Respiratory Infectious Disease Agents

Main Category: Respiratory / Asthma
Also Included In: Pediatrics / Children's Health;  Infectious Diseases / Bacteria / Viruses
Article Date: 23 Dec 2008 - 2:00 PST

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BioTrove, Inc. today announced its collaboration with Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) researchers in the evaluation of BioTrove's OpenArray® technology as a system to detect and monitor respiratory infectious disease pathogens in children. The study combines BioTrove's OpenArray nanofluidic polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technology platform with CHEO's clinical and molecular biology expertise for rapid, simultaneous identification and quantification of multiple viral and bacterial respiratory pathogens in a clinical specimen.

"Early diagnosis of infectious disease agents may help protect young patient lives, and ensure that other children and adults do not become infected. Using BioTrove's novel research technology, we intend to design an "all-inclusive" assay to rapidly identify and quantify over thirty infectious respiratory viral and bacterial disease targets, potentially enabling physicians to prescribe the right therapies for their patients almost immediately." said Robert Slinger, M.D., Program Director for Medical Microbiology at the University of Ottawa and Medical Microbiologist at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario in Ottawa, Canada. "CHEO is committed to improving pediatric patient care by developing rapid and comprehensive infectious disease diagnostic panels with this innovative technology."

Dr. Slinger and his colleagues will develop an assay panel simultaneously targeting multiple respiratory bacterial and viral infectious targets for the OpenArray platform. This will include key viral agents such as Influenza virus and emerging bacterial pathogens such as the "Superbug" MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus). As a result, CHEO researchers will be able to quickly identify a large number of infectious respiratory diseases in a specimen and simultaneously quantify the number of microorganisms at a higher speed and greater efficiency than possible with traditional diagnostic technology.

"Applying this technology to improve life is a key BioTrove goal, and Dr. Slinger and his team are staying true to that possibility by accelerating standards of care for infectious diseases," said Colin J.H. Brenan, Ph.D., Chief Technology Officer, BioTrove. "Their research may lead to additional applications for the OpenArray platform, and speaks to the viability and potential of this research system as an applied tool in the clinical laboratory setting."

About BioTrove, Inc.

BioTrove, Inc. offers two innovative technology platforms: OpenArray®, which advances genomic research in a wide range of life science fields, including agriculture, disease research, and public health, and RapidFire®, which enables the acceleration of drug discovery and pipeline decisions. With 11 of the 15 largest biopharmaceutical companies based on global sales as clients, and partnerships with prestigious research and public health centers around the world, BioTrove's products and services ensure that an industry committed to accuracy and speed can meet business goals.

The OpenArray® Platform enables genomics researchers to generate SNP and real time qPCR data in the hundreds of thousands of data points per day, significantly increasing the number of samples analyzed while significantly decreasing the time and cost required. The flexible format and nanoliter scale of the OpenArray system allows for easy adjustment of sample and assay numbers, achieving economical, high-throughput genomics.

RapidFire® Mass Spectrometry (RF-MS) feeds samples directly to the mass spectrometer at six to eight seconds per sample, eliminating the bottleneck created by traditional mass spectrometry throughput. RF-MS is routinely used in many applications including the high-throughput screening of previously intractable drug targets, ADME assays and directed evolution studies.

About the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario

Located in Ottawa, the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario is an academic health sciences centre providing treatment and diagnostic services for children and youth. CHEO is affiliated with the University of Ottawa and through its Research Institute conducts leading-edge research in child and youth illnesses.

Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario