The PROOF Centre of Excellence Partners with OriGene Technologies on Heart & Kidney Transplant Biomarker Program

ROCKVILLE, Md., July 19, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- OriGene Technologies, Inc. and Canada's Centre of Excellence for the Prevention of Organ Failure (PROOF Centre) today announced the selection of OriGene Technologies as a major collaboration and development partner to implement blood-based protein assays in heart and kidney transplantation. This multi-year, collaborative project funded by multiple partners will provide monitoring and predictive blood tests, based upon OriGene's extensive expertise in immunoassay and antibody development, to improve the care of heart and kidney transplant patients worldwide.

OriGene Technologies, as a leading assay development partner for the project, will leverage its industry leading collection of gene-centric tools, high quality monoclonal antibody validation technologies, and expertise in Luminex® multiplex assay development to create diagnostic assays for the clinical transplantation environment and integrate these novel tools to improve patient care. This is the first announced clinical development project that will utilize OriGene's highly validated and "mono-specific" antibodies known as UltraMAB™ Antibodies. UltraMAb antibodies are a newly released class of antibody products validated for specificity and low cross-reactivity, thus reducing potential side effects or false diagnostic reports in clinical studies.

According to a recently completed economic evaluation prepared by the PROOF Centre, the reduction in the costs from implementing blood based tests in organ rejection could result in savings of $700,000 over 5 years for the heart and kidney transplant programs in British Columbia. Furthermore, implementation of such tests would dramatically improve the quality of life for heart and kidney transplant patients and reduce the need for costly biopsies, which have no predictive value in measuring acute graft rejection, one of the most important causes of early morbidity and graft injury in organ transplantation patients.

"We are excited to be working with OriGene to utilize its collection of gene-centric tools and assay development expertise to positively impact the lives of patients experiencing heart and kidney transplantation. Through the success of our close collaboration, our ultimate goal is to meet an unmet clinical need in these patients through the development of accurate, high quality blood tests to reduce the risks, pain, and fear associated with current practices for detecting organ rejection," commented Dr. Bruce McManus, Director of the PROOF Centre.

Through the combined efforts of leading research institutes and commercial organizations, such as the PROOF Centre and OriGene, biomarker discovery and development are being effectively applied and moved to the clinical environment to address real world challenges faced by the global healthcare market. By creating novel classes of blood tests to monitor transplant patients, The PROOF Centre and OriGene are collaborating to usher in a new era of personalized medicine and integrating "omics" technologies to deliver a significant impact upon patient care.

"By applying our novel technologies and unique expertise in assay development to the challenges in the transplantation market, OriGene is has truly embarked on its mission to provide comprehensive technology solutions for biomarker development. We are pleased to have been selected as the premiere development partner for this critical project and playing a significant role in improving the quality of life for all patients in the global transplantation market" commented Dr. Wei-Wu He, Ph.D. CEO & Chairman, OriGene Technologies.

OriGene Technologies uses a high-throughput, genome wide approach to develop products for pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and academic research. The Company's flagship product is its cDNA clone collection, a searchable gene bank of over 30,000 human full-length TrueClone cDNA clones and over 25,000 TrueORF cDNA clones. From the TrueORF cDNA clones, OriGene has developed the largest offering of full length human proteins expressed in mammalian cells available. Recently, OriGene has embarked upon the development of the UltraMAB Antibodies, the industry's only "specificity-verified" and "mono-specific" monoclonal antibodies available and designed for diagnostic, as well as therapeutic applications.  Created through proprietary antibody validation technology, UltraMAB antibodies are a new paradigm in antibody accuracy and superior performance in antibody based applications.

About OriGene Technologies

OriGene Technologies, Inc. is a biosciences company dedicated to develop gene centric innovative products and services to improve the quality of healthcare diagnostics and treatments.   The Company's broadest collection of gene based products and services are important tools to accelerate the discovery of new diagnostics and drug treatments for better patient care.  OriGene has one of the largest scale antibody production and highest quality process facilities in the world.  For more information, visit www.Origene.com.

About the PROOF Centre of Excellence

The Centre of Excellence for the Prevention of Organ Failure (PROOF Centre) discovers, develops, commercializes and implements biomarkers to prevent, predict, diagnose and better treat and manage heart, lung and kidney disease. The PROOF Centre is a cross-disciplinary engine of partners representing academia, health care, government, industry, patients and the public, focused on improving health and reducing the enormous socioeconomic burden of heart, lung and kidney disease.

The PROOF Centre is a not-for-profit society established in March 2008 by competitive funding from the Networks of Centres of Excellence Secretariat under the Centre of Excellence for Commercialization and Research (NCE CECR) Program. The PROOF Centre is co-hosted by the University of British Columbia and Providence Health Care in Vancouver, British Columbia. For more information visit www.proofcentre.ca.

SOURCE OriGene Technologies, Inc.