OcimumBiosolutions develops Sulfolobussolfataricus microarrays

Online, May 31, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India, May 31, 2010: Ocimum Biosolutions, a leading global integrated genomics company, proudly announces its association with the SulfoSYS project (http://www.sulfosys.com).

In a project coordinated by Prof. John van der Oost, Ocimum Biosolutions constructed the genome microarray for Sulfolobus solfataricus - the archaeal model organism of choice for a systems biology approach to study the evolution and characteristics of central cellular functions in living cells.

Prof. John van der Oost said "We have very good experience with the mentioned microarrays, and we and other members of the Solfolobus Chip consortium were impressed by the quality of the slides provided."

Ms. Anu Acharya, CEO of Ocimum Biosolutions said "For esteemed researchers like Prof. John van der Oost, who want to target specific genes, or small genomes, our OciChip™ custom microarrays have become the platform of choice. These cost-effective microarrays can be used on all open array platforms, unlike other proprietary technologies. In addition, our sophisticated bioinformatics expertise results in highly sensitive and specific microarrays. These twin benefits have helped us become the preferred partner of consortia like SulfoSYS."

About SulfoSYS
In the SulfoSYS project, within the transnational SysMO initiative (http://www.sysmo.net/), 10 European partners study the central carbohydrate metabolism (CCM), i.e. the branched ED pathway of S. solfataricus and its regulation under temperature variation by the integration of genomic, transcriptomic, proteomic, metabolomic, kinetic and biochemical information as well as modeling. The long term goal of the project is to build a sufficiently precise replica for this part of the living cell "a Silicon Cell" to enable computation of life, particular its robustness to changes in temperature, at the system level. For more information, please visit http://www.sulfosys.com.

About OciChip™ Custom Microarrays
OciChip™ Custom microarrays are epoxy-coated glass slides onto which the sequences from thousands of different genes are immobilized, or attached, at fixed locations. First, for each gene of interest, 50 to 70 mer oligonucleotides are bioinformatically designed excluding dimers and, secondary structure formation, thereby ensuring highly reproducible hybridization achieved by precisely defined GC-content/melting temperature. Then, based on the researcher's study objective, the layout of these oligonucleotides on the microarray is bioinformatically designed with maximal reduction of cross-hybridization & avoiding background contamination. The oligonucleotides are then synthesized and QCed using mass-spectrometry. These oligonucleotides are then mechanically micro-spotted on the epoxy-coated glass slides.
Note: Apart from oligonucleotides, Ocimum also spots genomic DNA clones, cDNA, proteins, peptides, lipids, carbohydrates, and other small molecules.
For more information, write to [email protected] or visit http://www3.ocimumbio.com/laboratory-sample-data-management/research-consumables/microarrays/