Bar Harbor: Jackson Lab makes progress in fertilization techniques
(sz) Scientists at The Jackson Laboratory are making major advancements in in-vitro fertilization techniques and hope to license the technology and make it commercially available, according to lab officials.
As a boost to this effort, Jackson Lab has received a Maine Technology Institute grant that will help fund research toward creating a standardized, automated system for in-vitro fertilization.
The grant for $12,500 is small by Jackson Lab standards — the lab received more than $50 million from the National Institutes of Health in 2007 — but the implications of the grant help illustrate a point that business leaders and government officials have been saying for years. Because of groundbreaking work being done at Maine firms such as Jackson Lab and Idexx Laboratories in Westbrook, among others, the state has the potential to become a global leader in the field of biotechnology, they have said.
Jackson Lab, known worldwide for its research in using mice to study the genetic causes of human disease, in 2006 spun off its first for-profit entity, Bar Harbor Biotechnology in Trenton, which manufactures genetic profile kits used in disease research. The research the MTI grant will help pay for could result in the lab spinning off another commercial enterprise that would be based in Maine, according to lab officials.
According to Shane Beckim, program associate at MTI, the grant will help fund six to nine months of fertilization research at the lab. more…
From: »Bangor Daily News«