VizX Labs launches Web-based
microarray analysis software,
GeneSifter.Net™, and signs international distribution agreement
with Japanese trading company
Seattle, WA -- October 2, 2002 -- Responding to research scientists
who've expressed a desire to gain direct and timely control over
volumes of data emerging from their microarray experiments, VizX
Labs LLC today introduced GeneSifter.Net™, a platform-independent
Web-based microarray analytical software system that is customizable
for data collection and management.
GeneSifter.Net was designed de novo using Web-based "thin-client"
architecture. The product enables a laboratory scientist to load
data from microarray image files, scanners or sensors into a VizX-developed
database. Each database is backed up automatically, kept secure
and made accessible from any Web-enabled computer system worldwide.
The supporting software architecture makes for simple and straightforward
utilization, installation, maintenance, and database management,
resulting in convenient operations and lower overhead costs.
GeneSifter.Net's user-friendly layout provides power for high
productivity and includes many features previously available only
in enterprise software:
- An intuitive interface that can be customized to individual
laboratories
- User preferences for organizing, archiving and annotating
biological research data
- Remote collaboration, including password-protected user access
and system administration
GeneSifter.Net is available at significantly lower cost than
comparable enterprise-level installations.
VizX Labs negotiates international distribution agreement
for Japan
Concurrent with the launch of GeneSifter.Net, VizX Labs has signed
a three-year exclusive international distribution agreement with
Marubun Corporation, Tokyo, Japan, to distribute GeneSifter.Net
to molecular biology laboratories in Japan. The agreement with
Marubun, a major Japanese trading company with annual revenues
of approximately US $1.1 billion, opens the door to one of the
fastest growing biotechnology centers in the world and provides
international commercial validation for VizX's new approach to
bioinformatics. GeneSifter.Net is the first product to be distributed
under this agreement.
Product introduction follows extensive user testing
Industry observers, beta testers and initial customers have reported
GeneSifter.Net facilitates time-consuming routine laboratory tasks,
allowing them to focus on information emerging from their experiments.
It accelerates their efforts to pull comprehensive analyses together
for drug development programs, life science research and the associated
tasks of collaboration and publishing data.
A leading authority in gene expression, biochemistry, and genomics,
Mark Schena, PhD, believes that GeneSifter.Net addresses the task
of microarray analysis and data management in an elegantly straightforward
and accessible manner. He reports that it quickly sorts microarray
data and addresses the needs of microarray scientists by providing
novel Internet-based solutions. "The browser-driven idea is a
sound one because it affords researchers the most current gene
and protein databases, and world-wide access to tools and past
queries," he said.
"Instead of drowning users in a sea of information, GeneSifter.Net
provides users with targeted abilities, making the data manageable,"
Dr. Schena said. "All truly great tools are simple. People may
hesitate to adopt them because they misconstrue design elegance
as being too simplistic. However, overbuilt software can make
analyzing microarray data excruciating and not provide the gene
expression correlations that are most relevant biologically."
Dr. Schena with colleagues at Stanford University published the
first paper on microarrays in Science in 1995, (Schena, M., Shalon,
D., Davis, R.W. and Brown, P.O., Quantitative monitoring of gene
expression patterns with a complementary DNA microarray. Science
270, 467-470, 1995), and was considered to be a catalyzing force
in the explosive proliferation of microarray technology at academic
and commercial centers. Now a Visiting Scholar at Silicon Valley-based
TeleChem/arrayit.com, a leading microarray technology company,
Dr. Schena is currently applying his expertise consulting with
academic and commercial laboratories. His third textbook, Microarray
Analysis: Mining the Human Genome, John Wiley and Sons, will be
published in October 2002.
Beta users and early adopters report a broad spectrum of improvements
in their research operations:
"I've worked with microarrays
for years, but our department had never adopted any specific software
for analysis," said Eileen Mulvihill, PhD, Research Assistant
Professor of Pathology at the University of Washington. "We always
did it ourselves using Excel, contracted with a software programmer
for a specific project, or we found ourselves pulling together
a number of software packages. GeneSifter performs the same functions
in a way that is really quite easy to use," she said. "Perhaps
more importantly, as I've been working from Seattle with three
research groups in England, Toronto and Houston, we've been able
to look at data with them in real time. That heightened collaboration
has been particularly valuable," she said.
"With GeneSifter, the information really is at our fingertips.
Time-consuming tasks are now routine," said Stephen Schmechel,
MD, PhD, Research Fellow in Laboratory Medicine at the University
of Washington, and consultant to Rational Diagnostics, a Seattle-based
clinical genomics company. Dr. Schmechel and his laboratory staff
began using GeneSifter.Net almost a year ago as beta testers of
the package. The Rational Diagnostics team has employed GeneSifter.Net
to identify genes associated with cancer, and presented its first
findings, a study using GeneSifter.Net to investigate expression
patterns that distinguish Lymphoma subtypes, last month at the
Third Annual Northwest Microarray Conference in Seattle.
"As we correlate genes with their function, one of our challenges
has been to stay current with the most recent data about genes
of interest," he added. "GeneSifter.Net has provided us with a
means to do that without adding yet another task to our to-do
lists."
Gary Vanasse, MD, Instructor of Medicine at the University of
Washington, who is researching the molecular genetics underlying
lymphomas, is using GeneSifter.Net to manage vast amounts of data
from an ever-expanding number of microarray experiments, data
that needs to be leveraged for a variety of purposes.
"Many labs, including my own, have not found an easy-to-use analytical
tool that can assist them to simply mine, access and manage data,"
he said. "Using GeneSifter, what would have taken weeks was accomplished
in days."
Product demonstration
To arrange for a product demo, please contact N. Eric Olson, PhD,
Director of Science at VizX Labs, or his assistant, Sharon Schierle,
at 206.336.5606.
VizX Labs LLC
Vizx Labs develops Web-based software systems for the acquisition,
management and analysis of molecular biology data and information.
These products enable life scientists to readily incorporate sophisticated
data management and computational analysis into their research
efforts resulting in improved quality and productivity in experiment
design and decision-making processes.
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