Tripartite Development Of Optical Gene Mapping

Chiron Corporation, Ciba-Geigy and New York University have formulated an agreement in which all three will play a part in the development of NYU's revolutionary approach to optical gene mapping.

The technology involved, invented by David Schwartz, a professor at NYU, will have enormous potential for genetic disease diagnostics and therapy, according to Ciba, as it far surpasses the speed capability of conventional gene mapping protocols. "Dr Schwartz's remarkable technology...is a powerful tool with utility in the development of diagnostics, vaccine and therapeutic products technology, in particular the genomic analysis that feeds our programme in branched DNA quantitive probe tests," said William Rutter, chairman of Chiron.

Chiron, which has negotiated an exclusive worldwide license to the new technology in exchange for initial and milestone payments, potential royalty and development funding, has sublicensed the technology to Ciba for research purposes. Under the terms of the contract, Ciba will also provide Dr Schwartz' laboratory with research capital. Chiron and Ciba will also be jointly coordinating a research and development program at their R&D facilities in California and Switzerland. For Chiron this move illustrates its bid to become the major player in gene therapy; two weeks ago the firm made a $95 million offer for the purchase of gene therapy specialist Viagene.