NextGen Sciences and LabVantage Sign Agreement for Proteomics Research
NextGen Sciences Ltd., a company developing and manufacturing platform technologies for protein research, and LabVantage Solutions, Inc., announced today that they have signed a definitive Software Distribution Agreement that authorizes NextGen Sciences to resell and use LabVantage Sapphire Life Science LIMS. The agreement authorizes NextGen Sciences to fully integrate and leverage LabVantage’s Sapphire Life Sciences LIMS within NextGen Sciences’ ExpressionFactory for automated protein expression.
The Expression Factory combines a suite of biochemical tools with a completely integrated robotics system to express hundreds of proteins in parallel, and with complete automation capability to streamline the research process. The Expression Factory has an “expert” bioinformatics system called the Information Management System (IMS) that guides the researchers through the processes by which new expression constructs are created, and are then used to express proteins in bacterial and insect hosts. IMS includes extensive data handling, sample management, genealogy tracking, and rich workflow automation to manage these processes. The agreement provides NextGen Sciences access to LabVantage’s Sapphire LIMS information system, which when fully integrated with NextGen Sciences’ IMS, meets these exacting infrastructure requirements.
LabVantage Sapphire Life Sciences LIMS addresses proteomics needs by offering precisely traceable sample management that helps accelerate the investigation of new targets. Sapphire Life Sciences LIMS supports all documentation needs for 21 CFR Part 11 compliance.
“Last year our two organizations set out to assess how the Sapphire LIMS information system could be integrated into a complete solution for cloning and protein expression, and I am very pleased with what has been achieved,” said Dr. Kevin Auton, CEO of NextGen Sciences.
Working together, the two companies were able to combine the capabilities for tracking biological materials of LabVantage’s’ Sapphire, with the knowledge-based expertise inherent in NextGen Sciences’ IMS. This solution allows researchers to first plan entire processes for vector construction, gene cloning, and protein expression in silico before any bench work is undertaken. Flaws in the cloning strategy are identified early, saving a great deal of wasted effort from pursuing dead-end strategies at the laboratory bench. The genealogy tracking inherent in IMS also provides a complete audit trail that records the history for each biomaterial (vector, gene expression construct, cell line or protein), and how and from what it was assembled. The in silico workflow is then sent to the robotics system to perform each process, recording and tracking every operation in the IMS as each step is performed by the robotics. It is what NextGen Sciences calls “SMARTautomation.”
“This agreement is a culmination of many months of joint efforts to design and develop a world-class proteomics research offering for a scalable sample management technology framework,” said Jim Aurelio, President and CEO, LabVantage Solutions. “The relationship with NextGen Sciences provides LabVantage with additional market access for science-oriented companies requiring a flexible, scalable information management system for proteomics research.”
