Life Technologies have announced an exclusive agreement with Pathogenica, Boston, Massachusetts, to co-market and distribute for research use, the Pathogenica HAI (Hospital Acquired Infection) BioDetection Kit on the Ion Torrent PGM™ in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA).Based on Pathogenica's DxSeq™ technology and the Ion Torrent™ sequencing platform, the kit enables identification of pathogens with high accuracy, at high specific strain resolution and at a scale that could make hospital-wide testing practical.

'Hospital acquired infections are becoming an increasingly serious health risk for patients and present significant economic issues for hospitals,' said Peter Silvester, President, Life Technologies EMEA. 'The combination of Pathogenica's technology with the Ion Torrent PGM™ will provide a solution that can help address this problem by enabling hospitals to quickly detect these types of infections with extreme accuracy.'

Pathogenica's analysis software provides simple, concise output reports that indicate which species and strains are present and at what levels. These kits are not for use in the diagnosis of hospital patients.

Current methods for detecting causative organisms can take days for results or are limited to a few pathogens. The Pathogenica/Life Technologies HAI solution quickly and cost-effectively identifies not only what species are present in a sample, but also provides high-resolution sequence data that includes strain identity and resistance genes, which is critical information for understanding and containing or preventing HAI outbreaks. Pathogenica's kit can detect more than 12 pathogenic bacteria and 15 resistance gene families in a single assay and up to 12 samples can be tested per sequencing run. Dozens of samples can simultaneously be tested in one day with results in an impressive timeframe of less than 12 hours.

The companies are evaluating an opportunity to pursue CE marking together for use of the kit as an in-vitro diagnostic assay.

"As we enter yet another market with Life Technologies as our partner, it is gratifying that together we are helping to make hospitals safer around the world," said Yemi Adesokan, co-founder and CEO of Pathogenica. "The Ion Torrent™ PGM has continued to expand its installed base and is an excellent complement to our technology and our mission of making next-generation sequencing relevant and accessible to clinicians."

Each Pathogenica kit provides reagents for identification of the following pathogens and drug resistance markers per sample: Acinetobacter baumannii, Clostridium difficile, Escherichia coli, Enterococcus faecalis, Enterococcus faecium, Enterobacter aerogenes, Enterobacter cloacae, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Proteus mirabilis, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Coagulase negative Staph (S.epidermidis, S.saprophyticus), Staphylococcus aureus, common beta-lactamase resistance genes, mecA, and the vanA gene family. The technology allows for fast modification to incorporate the detection of emerging pathogenic fungi, viruses and resistances.

All products referenced are for Research Use Only. Not intended for diagnostic uses.