Actual Clones of Genetic Material are Now Available to Anyone for Study Under the Merck Gene Index Project.

Whitehouse Station, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 15, 1995--The unrestricted availability, for the first time ever, of actual copies (clones) of human genetic material is being announced today by Merck and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory as part of the Merck Gene Index initiative, which has been releasing sequence data on expressed human genes to public databases since February 1995. This new step will enable a scientist, student or anyone at all to look up in the public database the chemical (or nucleotide) composition of gene fragments, and then order actual clones of those fragments at a nominal cost in order to conduct further research on genes of interest.

Until now, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory had been providing clones to scientists upon request, but the Laboratory s ability to do so had been restricted by staffing capabilities. The Laboratory has just signed transfer agreements with five distributors under which the Laboratory will provide the clones, and the distributors will fulfill orders for them. Orders will be fulfilled within one or two days. The five distributors are: American Type Culture Collection of Rockville, Maryland; Genome Systems Inc. of St. Louis, Missouri; Research Genetics of Huntsville, Alabama; the Resource Center/Primary Database (Reference Library DataBase) of the German Human Genome Project in Berlin, Germany; and UK HGMP Resource Centre in Hinxton, England.

The Merck Gene Index Project is a cooperative effort of Merck & Co., Inc. (which coordinates and funds the project), Washington University s Genome Sequencing Center (which sequences the genetic material), Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (which collects, arrays and distributes the clones), the U.S. National Center for Biotechnology Information, and the University of Pennsylvania. The Merck Gene Index Project has produced more than 184,000 gene fragments, representing at least 30,000 genes, making this the largest such public project. Use of the genetic information is totally unrestricted, meaning that neither Merck nor any of the collaborators will have any claim to products that might evolve from the information.

This new step, which will make available the actual genetic material, along with the public accessibility of the corresponding sequence information, said Dr. Alan Williamson, Vice President, Research Strategy Worldwide, Merck Research Laboratories, will help facilitate a faster and deeper understanding of the complete human biology.

Merck & Co., Inc. is a leading research-driven pharmaceutical products and services company. Merck discovers, develops, manufactures and markets a broad range of innovative products to improve human and animal health. The Merck-Medco Managed Care Division manages pharmacy benefits for more than 45 million Americans, encouraging the appropriate use of medicines and providing disease management programs. Through these complementary capabilities, Merck works to improve quality of life and contain overall health-care costs. In addition to delivering these benefits to society, Merck is committed to providing superior returns for shareholders and a stimulating work environment for employees.

CONTACT: John Doorley Gordon Yano

Merck & Co., Inc. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

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Dr. Jeff Sturchio

Merck & Co., Inc.

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