Active Motif Licenses Methylated-CpG Island Recovery Assay (MIRA) from City of Hope


April 9, 2009 – Active Motif, Inc. is pleased to announce it has entered into an exclusive licensing agreement with the City of Hope for use of the Methylated-CpG Island Recovery Assay (MIRA)*. This technology has been incorporated into the launch of Active Motif’s MethylCollector™ Ultra Kit.

Active Motif, Inc. of Carlsbad, Calif. recently launched MethylCollector™ Ultra, a new DNA methylation assay for the enrichment of CpG-methylated DNA. MethylCollector™ Ultra improves upon the currently available methyl-binding protein capture and antibody-based immunoprecipitation methods. The kit is based upon City of Hope’s technology, which uses a combination of methyl-binding protein MBD2b with its binding partner MBD3L1, to generate a higher affinity for CpG-methylated DNA. The fast, magnetic assay can be completed in less than 3 hours and efficiently isolates methylated CpGs from as little as 170 cells (~1 ng DNA).

DNA methylation is an epigenetic event that affects cell function by altering gene expression. DNA methylation is involved in embryonic development and cell cycle regulation, while aberrant methylation is prevalent in many human cancers.

“The launch of the MethylCollector™ Ultra Kit is an important step in Active Motif’s goal of accelerating discovery in the field of epigenetic biology. The availability of an assay that reduces the amount of time and effort required, and works with limited amounts of starting material creates a great platform for discovery, in a very exciting area of epigenetics” Joe Fernandez, CEO of Active Motif, Inc. commented.

 

About Active Motif

Active Motif, Inc. is dedicated to developing, manufacturing and delivering innovative tools to enable epigenetics and gene regulation research. Its customers include life scientists from academic and government institutions; biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies; hospitals and reference laboratories.

Active Motif operates globally through its corporate headquarters in Carlsbad, California; European headquarters in La Hulpe, Belgium; Asian headquarters in Tokyo, Japan and Shanghai, China, as well as a worldwide network of sales and support offices. Active Motif applies a multi-disciplinary approach to create new and modify existing technologies to meet the current and future needs of life science researchers.