Motorola Team To Lead Development of Biochip Device That Rapidly Diagnoses Infectious Diseases.

TEMPE, Ariz.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 7, 1999--

The National Institute of Standards and Technology's (NIST) Advanced Technology Program has selected a team headed by Motorola Labs to develop a biochip-based device that would enable the rapid diagnosis of life-threatening bacterial infections.

The three-year, $9 million project, based at Motorola Labs' Physical Science Research Laboratories (PSRL) in Tempe, will also include researchers from Arizona State University, CFD Research Corporation of Huntsville, Ala., and Motorola BioChip Systems.

The goal of the project is to develop a small inexpensive device that could rapidly profile bacteria, which in turn would help to control the spread of often deadly infections. The envisioned microfluidics device would be capable of performing all preparation steps and genetic analysis functions on a single biochip.

Today, traditional laboratory diagnoses require great expertise, expensive equipment and can be extremely time-consuming. The new device proposed by the team will be a disposable plastic device that can be used in doctors' offices and hospitals for rapid diagnosis. In addition the technology can be extended to assist in environmental studies.

"The incidence of life-threatening bacterial infections has been rising in recent years, along with increases in the severity and drug-resistance of bacteria," said Jim Prendergast, Motorola vice president and PRSL director. "Once successfully developed, this device will be sufficiently sensitive, specific, rapid and low in cost to enable its use in broad medical and scientific applications plus agriculture, food sciences and pharmaceuticals."

The NIST's Advanced Technology Program provides cost-shared funding to companies that undertake high-risk R&D projects that have the potential to spark important, broad-based economic benefits for the United States. The new biochip-based technology could expand the market for point-of-care devices, now expected to be a $1.3 billion industry in the year 2000.

Specifically, Motorola Labs will be responsible for designing and fabricating the device and for developing and building the test station. CFD Research Corporation will develop modeling tools for device optimization resulting in faster, more efficient prototype development. Arizona State University will provide its expertise in immunology and relevant subfields of biology. Motorola BioChip Systems pioneers the development of technologies to translate the promise of genomics into practical solutions.

Motorola Labs focuses on developing and bringing to the marketplace exciting new technologies and solutions for customers. Among the current areas of research are wireless video, secure communications, human interface techniques including speech recognition and generation, highly reliable communications techniques, new semiconductor materials and processes, advanced circuit design technologies, internet and networking software and engineering efficiency enhancements and biotechnology. Motorola Labs was established in November 1998 to consolidate the enormous talent resident within numerous corporate, group and sector research organizations of Motorola, Inc. (NYSE:MOT). Motorola Labs is staffed by nearly 1,000 researchers located in Australia, China, France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States.

NIST's ATP support significantly accelerates potentially important R&D projects, projects that industry on its own could not fully support because of the technical risks involved, and that acceleration is critical to eventual economic success in the highly competitive global market. In many cases, ATP support is essential for the project to take place at all. The program is managed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, part of the Technology Administration of the U.S. Department of Commerce.