Amersham Pharmacia Biotech to Distribute Martek's Fluorescent Products.

COLUMBIA, Md--(BW HealthWire)--March 1, 1999--Martek Biosciences Corporation (NASDAQ: MATK) today announced that it entered into an exclusive supply agreement with Amersham Pharmacia Biotech, Ltd. for a proprietary group of products based on its PBXL(TM) fluorescent dyes. The dyes provide sensitivity, simplicity and speed to assays, and they enable the use of low cost components.

The PBXL(Tlecules on solid materials such as western blot filter membranes and DNA array glass slides. Application of the PBXL(TM) dyes to instrumented protein immunoblotting provalysis."

Commenting on the agreement Amersham Pharmacia Biotech's, Mindy Lee said, "Martek's PBXL reagents allow us to expand significantly our fluorescence and chemiluminescence product offering, which complements perfectly our scanners and Hybond(TM) range of membranes. Initial marketing efforts will very much focus on immunoblotting."

Protein immunoblotting is a technology that detects specific proteins on a membrane with antibodies attached to that protein. The antibodies, in turn, can then be detected by direct fluorescence with the PBXL(TM)-3 labels. Such immunoblotting methods can be applied to both research and clinical areas, where confirmation of the presence of specific proteins is required - for example in the detection of the microbes and viruses causing HIV infection, Lyme disease, and Tuberculosis.

Amersham Pharmacia Biotech is a major international biotechniques company; it provides innovative and leading-edge technology solutions to the problems faced by researchers and engineers aiming to discover and produce new drugs and therapies, faster and more cost-effectively than ever before. The market leader in virtually all of its markets, the company's novel systems are used to sequence DNA, uncover the function of genes and proteins, separate biomolecules, screen potential drugs and manufacture biopharmaceuticals.

Martek Biosciences Corporation develops, manufactures and sells products from microalgae. The Company's products include: (1) specialty, edible oils for infant formula, nutritional supplements and food ingredients that play a beneficial role in promoting mental and cardiovascular health, and in the development of the eyes and central nervous system in newborns; (2) high value reagents and technologies to visualize molecular interactions for drug discovery and development and; (3) new, powerful fluorescent markers for diagnostics, rapid miniaturized screening, and gene and protein detection.

This press release contains forward-looking statements regarding the commercialization of Martek's fluorescent marker products. Such statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ due to a variety of risk factors set forth in Exhibit 99.1 to the Company's Form 10-Q for the fiscal quarter ended July 31, 1998, as well as other disclosures set forth in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including but not limited to its filed reports on Form 10-K, Form 10-Q and Form 8-K.