Mobious Genomics Ltd. Launches Two New Plasmonic Devices

EXETER, England, March 10 /PRNewswire/ -- - Bulk Refractive Index Compensated Proteomics Array & Highly Multiplexed Label-Free Real-Time PCR

Mobious Genomics is pleased to announce the launch of two new technologies. The group has developed a new plasmonic sensing technique that it believes will address the key issues limiting the applicability of Surface Plasmon Resonance (SPR) to proteomics and genomics.

SPR is currently widely used to characterise single biomolecular binding events. However its applications have been restricted by a combination of limited throughput and sensitivity to bulk refractive index changes.

Mobious's proprietary plasmon technology takes a new, label-free approach. The NanoPlasmon Platform(tm) unifies novel, array-based Plasmon interference measurements and intrinsic bulk refractive index compensation to overcome current noise limitations.

Molecular labelling is widely used today in proteomic, genomic and clinical research environments. Its advantages are its ease of use, sensitivity and throughput capabilities. However, current methods have a number of widely acknowledged drawbacks, notably that the use of labelling moieties may disrupt the system being monitored, at which point it ceases to function as it would within its natural environment. This is especially true in protein-protein and protein-ligand (drug) interaction studies.

Mobious NanoPlasmon(tm) Proteomics Array

All currently available label-free SPR based techniques suffer from restrictive experimental noise. This arises from what is known as "bulk" refractive index (RI) changes within fluid environments. Such events obscure the molecular interaction kinetics that are under observation.

In "real-life" systems the analyte under observation is injected into a fluid-phase SPR sensor, maintained with a running buffer. This change of relative RI between differing buffers obscures the changes in index that result from biomolecular interactions of interest. This noise-sensitivity places severe restrictions on the composition of the analyte and/or running buffers and hence the throughput and usability of the overall system. Furthermore, these restrictions may prevent true in-vitro experimental models of in-vivo molecular processes.

In contrast, Mobious's next generation NanoPlasmon(tm) proteomics array, with its proprietary integrated RI compensation, allows the user to inject molecules of interest in buffers of differing refractive index whilst maintaining signal-to-noise ratio. Further, the system allows the user to select rapid changes in experimental temperature whilst simultaneously monitoring the resulting kinetic changes across an array of bound biomolecules. This allows the user to obtain multidimensional data for each point on the array.

Mobious is also offering pharmaceutical companies early access to this technology via its high-throughput biomolecular interaction drug discovery program.

Real-time PCR

Mobious has further exploited intrinsic bulk refractive index compensation in its proprietary, highly multiplexed, label-free real-time PCR device.

This technology can quantify the presence of a set of target polynucleotides within a sample, without the use of fluorogenic probes. We believe that this has a number of practical consequences, particularly within the research and clinical markets. There are, for example, considerable benefits to be derived from circumvention of third-party intellectual property, especially within the clinical marketplace.

However the technology also has the potential to significantly outperform existing processes, with material cost savings. As it does not need to rely upon fluorescent probe systems, it removes the fundamental restrictions that currently exist in such assays, which result directly from sequence-probe and probe-probe interactions. Addressing this will facilitate a vast improvement in throughput as it removes the spectral overlap between same-tube fluorogenic assays whilst simultaneously increasing flexibility in assay design via the removal of probe interaction sequence restrictions.

Mobious's parallel format allows highly multiplexed real-time assays to be carried out in a single reaction vessel. In Mobious's real-time systems, therefore, the only practical restriction on the level of multiplexing is dictated by the PCR chemistry itself, not the detection platform.

Such a system has clearly apparent applications in the clinical market. Most notably, it has the ability to reduce the cost of bacteriological and virological quantitative assays, especially in such widely used tests such as those for HIV, TB and Hepatitis as well as recently developed assays such as those for SARS. The platform also offers broad potential benefits in the management of long-term viral infections such as HIV. For example, the use of highly active anti-retroviral therapy (HAART) has reduced the plasma load of HIV-1 to undetectable levels. Viral reservoirs, however, still persist and label-free real-time PCR in combination with newly designed assays offers a cost effective way to study the clinical progress of large numbers of patients whose HIV-1 plasma RNA levels have been reduced to undetectable levels. The system can also be readily applied to a vast number of infectious diseases of increasing concern in today's environment of air travel and rapid population mixing.

High levels of multiplexing allows simultaneous extraction of multidimensional data, for example such as strain and subtype. For the research sector, the benefits lie in the platform's sensitivity and dynamic range advantages over conventional oligonucleotide arrays for expression analysis as well as its throughput and assay advantages over conventional real-time systems.

Notes to editors Mobious Genomics Limited

Founded in 1999 by Daniel Densham and based in Exeter, UK, Mobious Genomics is pioneering breakthrough technologies in the unification of biological molecular systems and artificial nanostructures for direct, real-time, analysis of genomic and proteomic molecular systems.

Mobious's sequencing, proteomic and real-time amplification technology platforms all involve the cutting edge application of biophysics, bionanotechnology, molecular biology and computer science.

Each platform is designed to be ultra-high throughput and require minimal sample preparation without labelling. This lack of any requirement for labelling technology gives Mobious's approaches a material advantage over other platforms, which require significant sample pre-preparation and use biologically incompatible labelling schemes. Mobious is positioned to supply its proprietary services to the global life science industries including European and US Genomics and pharmaceutical industries.

Mobious Genomics Ltd

CONTACT: Daniel.H.Densham, +44-8700-112-500