Company Announcements

Publicly held Protea Biosciences, whose products included Laser Ablation Electrospray Ionization (LAESI) Mass Spectrometry, filed for bankruptcy in December 2017. The company announced that as a result of these plans, in November 2017, George Washington University terminated its exclusive right to use LAESI. President David Halverson resigned in December 2017.

Trajan Scientific and Medical and Sierra Analytics partnered in January to combine Sierra Analytics’ HDExaminer software for Hydrogen-Deuterium Exchange (HDX) data analysis with Trajan’s workflow automation expertise, including that of the LEAP Technologies business. Trajan will be a global partner and support provider for the software.

SCIEX announced in February a co-marketing agreement with IROA Technologies, a reagents and kits company specializing in metabolomics analyses. The companies will promote a unique labeling kit called the IROA Workflow Kit with SWATH Acquisitions based on next generation metabolomics and TripleTOF Systems.

Dr. Amy E. Herr, John & Lynne Dewar Lloyd Distinguished Professor of Bioengineering at the University of California, Berkeley and a Chan Zuckerberg Biohub Investigator, was named in February the recipient of the 2018 SCIEX Microscale Separations Innovations Medal and Award (previously the Arnold O’Beckman Award), for Current and Breakthrough Research in the Field of Electro-Drive Separations.

In February, Thermo Fisher Scientific announced that its LC/MS and IRMS workflows were used by the Korea Institute of Science and Technology’s Doping Control Center, a World Anti-Doping Agency-accredited laboratory responsible for screening and identifying banned substances in athletes from around the globe during a major sports event in South Korea.

In 2017, Microsaic Systems revenues declined 59.8% to £342,514 ($439,121), as the company switched its market focus from small molecule pharmaceuticals to bioprocessing, and to a solely OEM model. Adjusted operating loss increased from £2.7 million ($3.5 million) to £3.2 million ($4.0 million).

Microsaic Systems announced in March a commercial contract with the UK’s Centre for Process Innovation focused on examining the potential of its Microsaic MS offering as an online, deployable tool for the elucidation of biopharmaceutical or biologic structure during the manufacturing or bioprocessing workflow.

In March, Microsaic Systems announced an agreement to combine its 4500 MiD MS detector with Unimicro Technologies‘ CE platform. The combined product will be sold directly by Unimicro in China.

Microsaic Systems signed a Head of Terms agreement in March with Knauer to integrate their respective MS and LC technologies. The systems will be sold directly by Knauer.

In March, Bruker entered into a co-development and co-marketing agreement with Evosep to integrate the Evosep One LC system with its timsTOF Pro ultra­high resolution quadrupole TOF MS for high-throughput clinical proteomics.

In April, Electrophoretics, a subsidiary of Proteome Sciences, announced an amendment to the exclusive license and distribution agreement with Pierce Biotechnology, a part of Thermo Fisher Scientific, extending the current license to include intellectual property relating to a new class of higher-plex Tandem Mass Tags reagents currently in development.

Product Introductions

In February, Hiden Analytical introduced its new HPR-20 range of application-specific compact benchtop gas analyzers for dynamic measurement of in-process gas composition. Systems are routinely used in conjunction with thermal gravimetric analyzers.

SCIEX announced in February OptiFlow Quant Solution for easy, highly sensitive biomolecule quantitation. It comprises the new M5 Microflow LC with Phenomenex microflow columns and the new OptiFlow Turbo V Source. The new microflow LC has flow rate capabilities from 1–200 μL/min flow ranges, along with an auto-sealing injection needle, updated auto sampler with injector wash pumps and vial bottom sensing technologies. The OptiFlow Turbo V Source is a new single-click source that requires no physical adjustments for optimal ionization performance.

In March, Advion released the Open Port Sampling Interface designed for simple sampling of solids, liquids and sample preparation tips and fibers. Paired with the ESI of the expression Compact Mass Spectrometer, the product incorporates an open port of continuous small flowing volume of solvents directly into the MS.

Premier Biosoft released in March a database of glycans curated from published literature to facilitate rapid identification of N-glycans of rhEPO using tandem MS data.

JPT Peptide Technologies released in April The Human Proteome Peptide Catalog, calling it the first and most comprehensive online resource for validated reference peptides in MS- based proteomics. It provides fast access to more than 400,000 light and heavy proteotypic peptides.

Sales and Orders of Note

In March, SGS announced the installation of a second SCIEX 6500+ Triple Quadrupole MS for mycotoxins, pesticides and antibiotics testing at its Brookings South Dakota laboratory.