EC Awards Money to Develop QUIAtech’s Reversible Terminator Technology
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QUIAtech has announced that the European Commission has funded a two year cooperative research project to develop the QUIAtech reversible terminator technology.
According to QUIAtech, this will enable the development of DNA array based sequencing by synthesis. Creating a DNA sequencing platform that is faster and effective than those currently available, with the potential of fulfilling future demands for understanding diagnosis, treatment, prevention of disease and point of care personalized medicine.
The consortium consists of QUIAtech AB, Uppsala Sweden, Asper Biotech, Tartu Estonia, Fermentas, Vilnius, Lithuania, Johann Wolfgang Goethe University of Frankfurt, Germany, Tartu University, Tartu, Estonia, and Silex Microsystems AB, Järfälla, Sweden.
Prof. Andrew Griffiths, ISIS, Strasbourg, France will be linked to the project as an external Scientific Advisor. The project will begin the 30th August 2005.
The research is based on analyzing and comparing different portions of the human genome and draft versions of the whole genome and there is an obvious need for complete data sets to identify the minor variations that makes us all individuals. These variations have been shown to be linked to different diseases and the response to drug treatment.
The cost of current sequencing methods will continue to severely limit the amount of data that can be produced for clarifying the genetics of human health and disease. Current methods are therefore likely to miss rare differences and will have limited ability to determine long range information.
Sequence analyses of microbial genomes, like bacteria viruses and fungi have become a powerful tool for identification and characterization of these organisms.
With the increasing outbreaks of infectious diseases like salmonella, tuberculosis and HIV and the high frequency of multi drug resistance among several of the causative organisms a fast cost effective sequencing tool will help the medical community in both diagnosis, containment and treatment.
