DPO™ and TOCE™ Technologies from Seegene to be Licensed to DuPont for Food Safety Testing

Seegene Inc., a leading developer of multiplex molecular technologies and multiplex molecular diagnostic tests, has announced that it has entered into a licensing agreement with Dupont Nutrition & Health. This agreement marks the extension of Seegene's core molecular technologies into the multi-billion dollar food safety testing market.

Specific terms of the licensing agreement have not been disclosed. However, the agreement covers the utilization of Seegene's novel DPO™ and TOCE™ technologies in highly multiplexed real-time PCR assays for the Dupont™ BAX® System.

"Our agreement with DuPont opens a significant new market opportunity for our portfolio of multiplex molecular technologies," said Dr. Jong-Yoon Chun, founder, CTO and CEO of Seegene. "Leveraging our multiplex molecular technologies, food safety testing can change the current approach of 'one test, one pathogen', to a 'one test, many pathogens' testing paradigm. This can significantly improve the efficiency and effectiveness of food safety testing, and help reduce the prevalence of foodborne illness."

According to The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, foodborne illnesses each year in the U.S. alone affect 48 million people.

DPO™ technology is a fundamental tool for blocking extension of non-specifically primed templates generating consistently high specificity. TOCE™ enables simultaneous multiple assay testing, by separating genes (that have been amplified with the real-time PCR technology) using the differences in their melting temperatures. Prior to TOCE™, multiple assays were difficult because even a small variation in the amplified gene sequence changes the melting temperature of the genes; and reduces the number of fluorescent signals that can be tested at the same time, due to fluorescent intervention among amplified genes. TOCE™ technology overcomes these limitations. It allows testing of multiple pathogens with one fluorescent material by ensuring that sequence variation does not change the melting temperature of the genes.