BioTex is committed to innovating and developing optical solutions to medical, biomedical, and environmental problems. Our current research focuses on early stage development of both diagnostic and therapeutic medical applications. Our goal in this mission is to build value in new technologies by directing effective research and development programs and demonstrating performance and commercial utility of promising new devices and procedures.
glucose sensing >>
Diabetes mellitus is a chronic disease of metabolism in which sugar levels in the blood are not properly regulated. Currently over 16 million Americans are believed to have this disease. In order to manage this disease, diabetics must carefully monitor their blood sugar levels and correct them with medication, exercise, diet modification, or insulin injections. Currently, the only method for obtaining accurate blood glucose measurements requires blood to be withdrawn from the body. This procedure is inconvenient, messy, carries a risk of infection, and is often painful. Consequently, many diabetics do not monitor glucose as carefully as they should.
BioTex is working to eliminate these problems by developing technologies which allow rapid, painless, and convenient access to accurate blood glucose readings without the need for blood withdrawal. BioTex has developed an implantable "window to the body" which allows near-infrared radiation to be used to measure blood glucose "non-invasively." BioTex has also developed a small, transcutaneously implantable "skin-port" which allows painless and rapid withdrawal of interstitial fluid for glucose monitoring. BioTex is also working on development of an advanced implantable polymer sensor containing glucose sensitive near-infrared fluorescent chemistry. When implanted just below the surface of the skin, this "smart tattoo" responds to local glucose levels and a simple optical device can be used to record these levels. Major research efforts are being invested to develop a "smart tattoo" sensor with a functional life-time of up to 6 months or even longer.
laser therapy >>
Lasers offer tremendous potential for surgical applications. There are a host of applications in which the ability to deliver large and selective doses of energy to almost any location in the body via small flexible optical fiber would allow for a significant reduction in surgical trauma and a concomitant reduction in patient recovery time and associated healthcare costs. For a number of reasons, this potential has yet to be fully realized, and lasers remain primarily rooted in dermatological (skin) and ophthalmological (eye) applications. BioTex is capitalizing on its expertise in thermal modeling, laser-tissue interaction, and optical and biomedical engineering to develop techniques and devices which broaden the horizon of laser therapeutic procedures.
A significant focus area is the development of the Visualase® System, with our research partner Visualase, Inc., which uses information from magnetic resonance images (MRI) to measure temperature profiles in an organ during laser therapy and to provide feedback control of the laser operation based on user input parameters. The system allows real-time interactive image-guided closed-loop feedback control of laser interstitial thermal therapy, and increases both the usefulness and safety of this technique. The Visualase® system will probably first find use in treatment of prostate cancer and otherwise inoperable brain tumors.
BioTex is also developing laser delivery techniques and devices including a cooled-tip catheter for laser treatment of ventricular tachycardia (VT), and a cooled laser balloon for the treatment of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). BioTex manufactures a range of diffusing tip optical fibers for interstitial laser thermal therapy, and we have also developed a small diameter water-cooled catheter which increases lesion size and makes laser procedures safer. BioTex is also developing and testing a novel technique for improving the effectiveness of laser removal of certain types of tattoos which are not well treated with current laser tattoo removal strategies.
optical diagnostics >>
The emerging field of "biophotonics" has resulted in the development of a number of new optical imaging techniques useful for applications ranging from understanding cell functions to detecting and diagnosing cancer.
The FIG-OCT (fluorescence image guided optical coherence tomography) project initiated by BioTex is aimed at creating a superior probe for early detection of cancer. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is a new imaging technique which provides highly detailed images of microstructures in superficial tissues and thus offers a potential for non-invasive "optical biopsy." However, OCT imaging has an extremely small field of view and is not practical for large scale cancer screening. On the other hand, tissue autofluorescence imaging provides a highly sensitive means to detect evidence of the very earliest biochemical changes associated with many cancers. Though sensitive, fluorescence is often not specific resulting in a high false-positive rate. BioTex is currently developing an endoscopic probe which combines simultaneous fluorescence and OCT imaging and allows for fluorescence image guidance of OCT screening thus harnessing the power of fluorescence to detect suspicious locations and the power of OCT to examine morphological microstructure. We have focused our preliminary development on early detection of oral cancer, and believe that FIG-OCT will provide a tool which is both highly sensitive and highly specific to cancer detection. Other applications where this device should prove useful include detection of cervical, urinary, and GI cancers.
microbial identification >>
BioTex has developed a “universal” assay which can be used to identify bacteria, fungi, viruses, or eukaryotes. The technique relies on MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry of amplified, transcribed, and fragmented RNA molecules and on comparison to a computer-predicted database of mass spectra computed from published sequence information. Compared to other nucleic acid identification methods, ours has the following significant advantages:
• “open” system – the technique does not rely on the design of organism-specific probes, but rather searches resultant spectra against all known sequence information
• fast, high-throughput technique – isolation and amplification of sample material is accomplished using conventional PCR, but subsequent transcription, cleavage, and mass-spectrometry characterization takes only 20-30 minutes compared to 12-24 hours for sequencing or micro-array analysis.
• amenable to mixture analysis – sequencing of samples containing mixtures of organisms requires cloning, separation of colonies, and subsequent sequencing of each individual plasmid. In contrast, a single mass spectrum from an organism mixture may be “mass finger-printed” to identify several organisms simultaneously.
• simple and inexpensive – relying on standard equipment (PCR cycler, MALDI-TOF spectrometer) found in many molecular biology laboratories, our technology does not require highly specialized instrumentation (like sequencers or micro-array hybridizers/imagers).
aptamers & siRNA >>
A certain portion of the ribosome in bacteria is highly tolerant to insertions and deletions of arbitrary RNA sequences. This trait is now being exploited to incorporate "aptamers" – nucleic acid ligands to virtually any molecular target – within the native ribosomal RNA of bacteria. The first application of this technology is to place aptamers within the ribosomes of bacteria to sequester highly bioactive contaminants found in water such as hormones, pesticides, and industrial by-products. The organisms can then be readily separated from process water streams removing compounds which are otherwise refractory to biological degradation.
Another feature of ribosomal insertion of foreign RNAs is that the RNAs are "camouflaged" from normal degradation or "turnover" within the cell. Thus, our modified ribosomal molecules accrue to high levels within the cell without major detriments to cell cultures (of E. coli). We are therefore interested in placing other RNA molecules of considerable importance within the ribosome. Short-interfering RNAs (siRNAs) hold great promise as therapeutics and value as research tools for gene-silencing. Unfortunately, RNA is very expensive to synthesize chemically. Our technology will allow siRNAs to be produced within the ribosome at high levels by conventional fermentation of E. coli followed by relatively inexpensive purification of the desired final siRNA product.
In addition to the research-intensive activities, BioTex is developing the in-house capability to develop aptamer ligands to arbitrary protein (as well as other molecular) targets. Please visit Ice Nine Biotechnologies website for more information.
microarrays >>
Because of the large amount of genetic information which can be rapidly accessed, DNA microarrays have become indispensable tools for biological investigations. Despite their utility, however, a number of experimental difficulties have resulted in widely varying data quality between and even within the same laboratories. One of the more difficult challenges is that DNA probes of the same length can have widely varying hybridization or melting temperatures (Tm's). The result is that suboptimal conditions are used for what are presently some of the most expensive experiments in molecular biology.
This project focuses on the development of a hardware system for producing optimal "temperature addresses" for every probe included in an arbitrary microarray design. This improvement will dramatically improve the accuracy and reproducibility of nucleic acid microarray data. Additionally, the envisioned system will allow for real-time image acquisition of the microarray while under temperature gradient conditions.
