Exiqon announces introduction of GLP compliant services for miRNA biomarker screening

Dec 27 2010

Exiqon A/S (Copenhagen:EXQ), a leading provider of technologies for biomarker detection, today announced the introduction of GLP compliant services for miRNA biomarker screening and diagnostic assay development for clinical trials.

Exiqon is already working with a number of global pharmaceutical companies in the search for biomarkers to support their clinical programs on future drugs, programs to support current drugs or to rescue failed drugs.

The experiences gathered from these collaborations have now been comprised in a new product offering for services provided under the guidelines of OECD's principles of Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) in support of ongoing clinical trials.

Exiqon can provide a full suite of services to support miRNA biomarker diagnostic programs in both clinical FFPE tissue as well as bio fluids. Exiqon provides complete project design, samples isolation and processing and biomarker analysis using Exiqon's LNA technology. Exiqon also provides bioinformatics packages to support technical development and interpretation of biomarker data.

Exiqon's unique position as a leader in the field of miRNAs means that customers get access to Exiqon's very extensive Data-biobank of miRNA data. For clinical tissue samples Exiqon has a tumor database containing hundreds of miRNA profiles from all major cancer types which can be used to support projects.

Exiqon has one of the world's largest collections of blood serum and plasma miRNA data containing thousands of samples from diseased and normal individuals. This is an unparalleled resource in allowing rapid development and
high quality QC of customer projects based on a leading understanding of miRNAs in blood.

"This clinical partnering service capability is a natural complement to our internal diagnostic programs and harness all the processes and infrastructure we have developed to drive our own diagnostics pipeline," says Adam Baker,
Director, Diagnostics and Pharma Services.

This recent addition to Exiqon's product offering allows the company to further exploit its position as the world's leading miRNA company to deliver customized high quality contract research services for clinical research and companion diagnostic programs to its partners based on Exiqon's proprietary LNA detection technology and miRNA biomarkers.