Life Technologies' Ion Proton(TM) to Power Stratified Medicine Scotland Innovation Centre

- Innovation Centre's ambitious approach to treatment of disease to dramatically improve patient outcomes whilst reducing overall healthcare costs.

GLASGOW, Scotland, April 23, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --

Life Technologies( http://www.lifetechnologies.com/us/en/home.html ) Corporation (LIFE) today announces that it is a lead commercial partner along with Aridhia,( http://www.aridhia.com ) a bio-medical informatics company, in the Stratified Medicine Scotland Innovation Centre (SMS-IC). The Ion Proton( http://www.invitrogen.com/site/us/en/home/Products-and-Services/Applications/Sequencing/Semiconductor-Sequencing/proton.html )(TM) sequencing platform will be the primary tool to drive discovery and genetic analysis as SMS-IC aspires to be a world-class centre of research, innovation and commercialisation in stratified medicine. The SMC-IC is a unique collaboration bringing together excellence in the academic, industrial and NHS( http://www.show.scot.nhs.uk/introduction.aspx ) communities to create an infrastructure that will act as a springboard to allow Scotland to be at the forefront of the field.

The First Minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond said: "Scotland has always been a world leader in innovation and this new funding for the Stratified Medicine Scotland Innovation Centre reinforces the Scottish Government's commitment to the Life Sciences securing Scotland's place as a world leader in innovative health technology. The pioneering research carried out by the innovation centres will not only improve the healthcare of patients but also, by way of the unique advanced process of diagnosis, could potentially save lives."

"The Stratified Medicine Scotland Innovation Centre is a ground breaking project that represents a real opportunity to change the way healthcare will be practiced," said Peter Silvester, President Europe, Middle East & Africa of Life Technologies( http://www.lifetechnologies.com/us/en/home.html ). "Life Technologies will provide facilities and the genetic analysis platform with its semiconductor based, Ion Proton( http://www.invitrogen.com/site/us/en/home/Products-and-Services/Applications/Sequencing/Semiconductor-Sequencing/proton.html )(TM) DNA sequencing technology, at a speed, accuracy and cost that would have been impossible just a few months ago. The vision for this project is to combine an individual's detailed genomic data with more traditional patient information to enable faster, more accurate and effective clinical decisions. This is an inflection point in the history of medical research, and there is much more to come."

Stratified medicine is recognised as a key strategic approach to the future diagnosis and treatment of disease and depends critically upon information; the integration of existing data sets to form a comprehensive 'personal' healthcare record and the generation of new data describing patient characteristics - genotype and phenotype - to permit 'stratification.'

Scotland's past investment in electronic health records (EHRs) and translational medicine research, coupled with a vibrant healthcare technology industry, positions Scotland as the location to drive forward the stratified medicine agenda globally. The aim of SMS-IC is to prove the principle of stratified clinical trials and in 2013 it will begin a series of exemplar projects which link patient phenotype, genotypic and other data types enabling precision targeting of populations for clinical trials. Although the Ion Proton( http://www.invitrogen.com/site/us/en/home/Products-and-Services/Applications/Sequencing/Semiconductor-Sequencing/proton.html )(TM)platform is currently for Research Use Only, the ultimate aim is to take stratified clinical trial models from concept to clinical practice. SMS-IC will run a competition to identify suitable projects and applications are invited from interested parties.

A semiconductor chip is at the heart of the Ion Proton's technology. Instead of relying on light-based technology and cameras to capture images of DNA sequences, the Ion Proton( http://www.invitrogen.com/site/us/en/home/Products-and-Services/Applications/Sequencing/Semiconductor-Sequencing/proton.html )(TM) System translates chemical information into digital data. The chip enables sequencing to be performed on a massively parallel format, drastically accelerating the sequencing process.

The Ion Proton( http://www.invitrogen.com/site/us/en/home/Products-and-Services/Applications/Sequencing/Semiconductor-Sequencing/proton.html )(TM)is For Research Use Only, not intended for diagnostic purposes.

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