Tecan and BlueGnome collaborate to improve repeatability of clinical arrayCGH

Tecan and BlueGnome have announced a joint development program to optimize the Tecan HS Pro™ series of automated hybridization stations and BlueGnome protocols for automated processing of BlueGnome's CytoChip™ diagnostic BAC microarrays.

Array-based comparative genomic hybridization (arrayCGH) experiments have the potential to increase the resolution of clinical investigations into the genetic basis of diseases. However, the relatively complex experimental protocols require further optimization before they can be used for clinical applications, where quality, experimental repeatability, traceability and audit are all major requirements.

The collaboration between Tecan and BlueGnome aims to meet these challenges, as Nick Haan, CEO of BlueGnome, explained: "Current manual arrayCGH protocols are labor-intensive and can be sensitive to slight variations in timing, temperatures and concentrations. Automating the protocol with the Tecan HS Pro ensures consistently high quality results are obtained from every CytoChip."

Ralph Beneke, product manager at Tecan, added: "The CytoChip has a number of exciting innovations that are fundamental to the clinical application of arrayCGH, including additional tiling of the clinically interesting regions and fully automated data analysis."

The combined Tecan HS Pro, CytoChip platform is already in routine use at several clinical laboratories in the UK. BlueGnome has been appointed as agents for the Tecan HS Pro in the UK as part of the program.