Omixon and Knome Partner to Offer Advanced HLA Typing for Whole Genome and Exome Level Data
CAMBRIDGE, MA — June 3, 2013 — Knome Inc., the human genome interpretation company, today announced that its Services division will now provide its clients with advanced HLA typing capabilities as part of its whole genome and exome interpretation offerings. These capabilities will be powered by Omixon’s Targeted HLA Typing technologies. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
The Human Leukocyte Antigen (HLA) genes are part of the immune system and play a role in number of areas, including infection, monogenic disorders, auto-immunity, cancer, transplantation, and drug response. HLA genes contain the genome’s highest concentration of potential biomarkers, with specific HLA genotypes currently being investigated as biomarkers in 69 clinical trials.
Despite its value, accurate and robust analysis of HLA genes has not been possible due to technical challenges related to repeated segments and pseudogenes significantly longer than the typical NGS read length of 150 to 250nt, a combination of extremely polymorphic exons and conserved regions, a haplotype structure, and phasing issues.
“Omixon has developed an excellent direct genotyping method from next generation sequencing that addresses the major problems associated with HLA calling,” said Wolfgang Daum, CEO of Knome. “They’ve developed industry-leading capabilities that we are very pleased to be able to incorporate into the informatics pipeline that powers our interpretation services offerings.”
“Knome helps to discover safer and more efficient therapies by identifying genomic biomarkers for drug response and adverse response,” said Attila Berces, CEO of Omixon.” “Thus, pharmaceutical companies can shorten the time to approval and reduce the risk of late-stage failures. Omixon is proud to contribute to Knome’s interpretation services by helping to understand HLA, which is a pharmacologically very important genomic region.”
About Knome
Knome Inc. is a leading provider of human genome interpretation systems and services. Knome provides tools and solutions that help researchers, drug developers, and clinicians determine the genetic basis of human disease and drug response. Designed to accelerate and industrialize the process of interpreting whole genomes, Knome’s big data technologies are helping to pave the healthcare industry’s transition to molecular-based, precision medicine.
About Omixon
Omixon helps clinical, diagnostic and research labs to adopt next generation sequencing for the benefit of patients, by providing accurate and validated data analysis software. Using the Omixon Target application suite scientists and clinicians are empowered to investigate challenging genomic regions, such the human leukocyte antigen (HLA), breast cancer susceptibility genes (BRCA1 and BRCA2), and cystic fibrosis gene (CFTR), as well as custom panels.
