Press Releases

Thermo Fisher Scientific and Matrix Science

SAN JOSE, California, (January 23, 2008) Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., the world leader in serving science, announces the integration of Matrix Science's Mascot search engine for protein identification with BioWorks software. SEQUEST and Mascot are the two most widely accepted search engines in the field for protein identification and PTM characterization - this offers users the ability to consolidate identification results from the two search engines and cross-validate the results to take advantage of the complementary information provided by each. Combining the capabilities of SEQUEST and Mascot allows researchers to exploit the information gleaned from two separate search engines, as studies have shown that different search engines match different spectra, resulting in little overlap, and subsequently, unique protein identifications for each. Including both search engines in the same software platform provides a new level of confidence in protein identification.

The new integration of SEQUEST and Mascot within the BioWorks platform will enable the kind of flexibility in mass spec data interrogation that customers have requested for some time.

John Cottrell of Matrix Science stated that "We are delighted that Thermo Fisher Scientific will be offering their customers the opportunity to purchase Mascot as part of a complete instrument and software platform". In addition Andreas Huhmer, Proteomics Marketing Director at Thermo Fisher Scientific said "It's all about flexibility for our LTQ, LTQ FT and LTQ Orbitrap customers - we want to give customers who've already chosen superior instrumentation the choice to analyze their data with the search engine they prefer, or to increase their protein coverage by combining the results from both."

Integration of Mascot provides users with comprehensive tools for data processing, protein identification, quantitation, and characterization.

Matrix Science develops and markets bioinformatics products and services for mass spectrometry-based proteomics. Mass spectrometry has become established as the method of choice for protein analysis, providing levels of speed and sensitivity that cannot be matched by other techniques. Mascot, Matrix Science's lead software package, searches mass spectrometry data against molecular sequence databases to identify the constituent proteins and characterize post-translational modifications. The search procedure is computationally intensive, requiring complex statistical calculations to be performed rapidly while streaming through large protein and nucleic acid sequence databases. The company is based in London, UK, and has offices in Boston, MA and Tokyo, Japan.

For more information about MASCOT visit www.matrixscience.com

Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. (NYSE: TMO) is the world leader in serving science, enabling our customers to make the world healthier, cleaner and safer. With annual sales of more than $9 billion, we employ 30,000 people and serve over 350,000 customers within pharmaceutical and biotech companies, hospitals and clinical diagnostic labs, universities, research institutions, and government agencies, as well as environmental and industrial process control settings. Serving customers through two premier brands, Thermo Scientific and Fisher Scientific, we help solve analytical challenges from routine testing to complex research and discovery. Thermo Scientific offers customers a complete range of high-end analytical instruments as well as laboratory equipment, software, services, consumables and reagents to enable integrated laboratory workflow solutions. Fisher Scientific provides a complete portfolio of laboratory equipment, chemicals, supplies and services used in healthcare, scientific research, safety and education. Together, we offer the most convenient purchasing options to customers and continuously advance our technologies to accelerate the pace of scientific discovery, enhance value for customers and fuel growth for shareholders and employees alike.

Visit www.thermofisher.com

Proxeon and Matrix Science collaborate to provide an integrated solution for proteomics research

August 23rd, 2007. Proxeon (Odense, Denmark) and Matrix Science (London, UK) today announced a product integration and co-marketing collaboration. Proxeon's ProteinCenter and Matrix Science's Mascot software applications will be integrated to facilitate data evaluation by proteomics researchers and, in particular, to enable biologists to make better use of proteomics data.

ProteinCenter, launched in 2006, provides an immediate insight into the biological relevance of the lists of proteins generated by mass spectrometry-based protein identification. Mascot is the search engine of choice for the great majority of proteomics researchers and has been the undisputed market leader for several years. By integrating Mascot and ProteinCenter, protein identification results will be rapidly transformed in a way that meets the growing needs of proteomics research and biology labs. Proxeon and Matrix Science jointly promoted the combined benefits of Mascot and ProteinCenter, at the American Society of Mass Spectrometry conference in Indianapolis in June this year.

"We are delighted to collaborate with Matrix Science and the team that has developed Mascot into the de facto standard search engine for MS protein analysis. We expect that a growing number of users will adopt the powerful combination of Mascot and ProteinCenter." stated Mr. Winge.

"Bringing Mascot and ProteinCenter together will offer new capabilities to the proteomics research community. The two software applications have a natural fit, and their combination enables users to focus on the real business of scientific discovery." explained John Cottrell, CEO of Matrix Science.

About Proxeon

Proxeon is an established provider of innovative products focused towards the proteomics market. Taking advantage of core internal competencies, Proxeon develops products and solutions that fulfil the need to enhance performance, solve technical challenges, and thereby accelerate the proteomics workflow, from sample preparation through to data interpretation.

In the field of mass spectrometry, Proxeon nano ES ion sources are used in over 700 laboratories, and the company is one of the world's largest suppliers of nano ES emitters. More recently, Proxeon added EASY-nLC, a system for high performance nanoscale chromatography, and ProteinCenter, software for easier data interpretation, to its commercial portfolio.

The company's products are used in leading academic and industrial research laboratories throughout the world. Established in 2002, Proxeon is headquartered in Odense, Denmark and has sales operations in the USA and Europe.

About Matrix Science

Matrix Science was founded in 1998 to develop and market the software needed to use mass spectrometry data in proteomics applications. The company is headquartered in London, UK with offices in Boston, USA and Tokyo, Japan. Matrix Science's lead product is MASCOT, a software suite for protein identification and characterization by matching mass spectrometry data against protein or nucleic acid sequence databases. Evidence for the popularity of MASCOT is provided by the number of mass spectrometry manufacturers who choose to bundle it with their instruments. First off the block was Bruker Daltonics, since joined by Shimadzu and Applied Biosystems. Agreements with other leading manufacturers are in the pipeline.

Waters Corporation and Matrix Science Ltd.'s Collaboration Accelerates Proteomics Research

Milford, Mass., April 26, 2005 - Waters Corporation today announced it has entered into a technical collaboration with Matrix Science Ltd., London, England, by which Matrix Science's Mascot™ interface will be incorporated into Waters® protein informatics platform - ProteinLynx Global SERVER™ 2.2. Waters ProteinLynx Global SERVER (PLGS) software is an integrated family of tools for automated protein identification and characterization. Engineered by Matrix Science, Mascot is a search engine, which uses mass spectrometry data to identify proteins from primary sequence databases. Today's announcement combines the strengths of each product line for the advancement of analysis and identification of proteins through mass spectrometry.

Under this arrangement, scientists using Waters ProteinLynx Global SERVER software can send queries to and display results from the Mascot search engine as well as the PLGS search engine in real-time on the company's MALDI micro MX™ and Q-Tof™ mass spectrometers. Similarly, scientists who primarily use Matrix Science software to process mass spectrometry data will benefit from enhanced support for Waters MassLynx™ data thanks to the integration of its file access libraries into Mascot Distiller.

Tim Riley, Ph.D., Vice President of Proteomics Business Development at Waters, stated, "Our collaboration with Matrix Science demonstrates Waters strong commitment to provide leading-edge analytical tools to the proteomic research community. Scientists can now achieve maximum confidence in their proteomics results sets as the laborious task of manually reviewing data is eliminated."

John Cottrell, Director at Matrix Science, said, "There is a very strong need among researchers for tools to integrate their results with data from other analytical sources in order to provide additional data management, data-mining, and reporting functions. We see this collaboration as bringing together two industry leading companies to drive the technology forward."

About Matrix Science

Matrix Science develops and markets bioinformatics products and services in the fields of mass spectrometry and proteomics. Currently one of the hottest areas of life science research, proteomics is the study of the protein complement of a cell or tissue in a specific physiological state. In recent years, mass spectrometry has become the method of choice for protein identification and characterization, analyzing large numbers of samples at high speed. Matrix Science's lead product is Mascot, a powerful search engine, which uses mass spectrometry data to identify proteins from primary sequence databases. While a number of similar programs are available, Mascot is unique in that it integrates all of the proven methods of searching.

About Waters Corporation

Waters Corporation holds worldwide leading positions in three complementary analytical technologies - liquid chromatography, mass spectrometry and thermal analysis. These markets account for $4.5 - $5.0 billion of the overall $20+ billion analytical instrument market.

Waters is a registered trademark and ProteinLynx Global SERVER, Q-Tof, MALDI micro MX and MassLynx are trademarks of Waters Corporation. Mascot is a trademark of Matrix Science Ltd.

Nonlinear Dynamics and Matrix Science Integrate Leading Proteomics Software Products

(Newcastle upon Tyne) Nonlinear Dynamics Ltd., a leading provider of bioinformatics solutions, today announced a close technical collaboration with Matrix Science Ltd., (London, UK). Under this agreement, Nonlinear Dynamics' protein informatics system will be enhanced to provide seamless integration with Matrix Science's Mascot Server.

Produced by Matrix Science, Mascot is a powerful search engine which uses mass spectrometry (MS) data to identify proteins from primary sequence databases. This new collaboration sees the incorporation of a Mascot interface into Nonlinear's upcoming protein informatics platform, providing an integrated solution for the analysis and identification of proteins through MS.

The protein informatics range follows the researcher's workflow, including experiment set-up, 2D gel image analysis, data-mining and MS-based protein identification. The central database integrates all data generated during this workflow and provides powerful data-mining tools to identify trends, patterns and outliers. Following this agreement, the system will be enhanced to enable users to link directly to a Mascot server. This will enable users to perform Mass Spectrometry searches employing Matrix Science's proven methods of searching, including peptide mass fingerprinting, and MS/MS ions searches.

John Cottrell, Director of Matrix Science, said, "Matrix Science develops and markets products which integrate mass spectrometry into bioinformatics. Our interests extend to all aspects of mass spectrometry in the life sciences. There is a very strong need among researchers for tools to integrate the results from Mascot with data from other analytical sources, such as gels and microarrays, so as to provide additional data management, data-mining, and reporting functions. We see this collaboration as bringing together two industry leading companies to drive the technology forward."

John Spreadbury, Group Sales and Marketing Director of Nonlinear Dynamics and CEO of Nonlinear USA Inc., added, "This collaboration is a significant development in Nonlinear's evolving portfolio of database and data-mining solutions. Nonlinear provide a comprehensive range of data-mining options, now enhanced with Mascot search facilities, to provide users with the complete protein informatics analysis platform. Nonlinear is delighted to partner Matrix in delivering the latest innovations to the proteomics marketplace."

Frost & Sullivan Calls Matrix Science's Product Line 'Gold Standard' in Mass Spectrometric Database Searching

Matrix's Mascot product line and Mascot search engine allow for the searching of mass spectrometry data against sequence databases, which is central to current proteomics approaches. Matrix provides the Mascot search algorithm both through its web search interface and by licensing the Mascot product line. The company is positioned as a key leader in this market segment.

"Matrix's technology incorporates proprietary algorithms, which gives the company a competitive edge in the proteome informatics market," says Nate Cosper, industry manager with Frost & Sullivan. "These widely used tools are the Gold Standard in searching proteomic databases."

The company meets a wide array of customer needs with additional modules of the Mascot product such as Mascot Cluster, Mascot Daemon, Mascot Distiller, and Mascot Parser

Technological innovations across its range of products and services, coupled with the flexibility of being able to couple various modules to create tailored solutions, has enabled Matrix Science to strengthen its relationships with both end-users and mass spectrometer vendors. Applied Biosystems, MDS Sciex, Bruker, and Shimadzu have integrated Mascot into their products to enable end-users to derive maximum benefit from their instruments.

Frost & Sullivan presents its Technology Leadership Award to the company that has pioneered and steered technological advances in its industry by providing cutting-edge products and concepts. As providers of revolutionary client specific solutions, the company has continuously excelled the incubation, adaptation, take-up, and maturity stages in the technology life cycle.

About Matrix Science

Matrix Science develops and markets bioinformatics products and services in the fields of mass spectrometry and proteomics. Currently one of the hottest areas of life science research, proteomics is the study of the protein complement of a cell or tissue in a specific physiological state. In recent years, mass spectrometry has become the method of choice for protein identification and characterization, analyzing large numbers of samples at high speed. Matrix Science's lead product is Mascot, a powerful search engine, which uses mass spectrometry data to identify proteins from primary sequence databases. While a number of similar programs are available, Mascot is unique in that it integrates all of the proven methods of searching.

Please visit www.matrixscience.com for more information.

About Frost & Sullivan

Founded in 1961, Frost & Sullivan is a global leader in growth consulting. Frost & Sullivan Awards are presented to companies that demonstrate excellence in their industry, commending the diligence, commitment, and innovative business strategies required to advance in the global marketplace. Frost & Sullivan rigorously analyzes specific criteria to determine award recipients in a vast variety of market industries and landscapes.

For further information, visit www.frost.com.

Matrix Science Establishes Subsidiary in Japan to Serve Growing Proteomics Market

The Tokyo-based management team, comprising Naoki Tanaka and Itaru Usami, has very extensive knowledge and experience of Matrix Science software products and their applications.

"Japanese science is exceptionally strong in proteomics technologies, especially mass spectrometry", said John Cottrell, one of the founders of Matrix Science. "This has made Japan a very important market for our software, consistently representing some 30% of our worldwide business. By establishing Matrix Science KK, we can provide a higher level of service to our present and future customers."

The establishment of Matrix Science KK was greatly assisted by The Japan External Trade Organisation (JETRO) - a Japanese government-funded organisation that promotes inward investment.

About Matrix Science

Matrix Science develops and markets bioinformatics products and services in the fields of mass spectrometry and proteomics. Currently one of the hottest areas of life science research, proteomics is the study of the protein complement of a cell or tissue in a specific physiological state. In recent years, mass spectrometry has become the method of choice for protein identification and characterisation, analysing large numbers of samples at high speed. Mascot, Matrix Science's lead product, is a software suite for protein identification that enables mass spectrometry data to be rapidly matched against protein or nucleic acid sequence databases.

NIH installs MASCOT^® protein identification software on central server

In a move that reflects growing use of MASCOT^® protein identification software, the National Institutes of Health, (NIH), one of the world's foremost medical research centres, has commissioned a central server for Matrix Science's market-leading proteomics package. Individual researchers within the NIH's 27 Institutes and Centres can now access this powerful resource to facilitate their proteomics research.

Installing a shared MASCOT server was a logical move, since a number of individual Centres had begun to set up local servers. Ten NIH Institutes met last summer to discuss the feasibility of setting up a central server, under the auspices of the Center for Information Technology (CIT). The server, which is a cluster of high performance PC's running the Linux^™ operating system, went live towards the end of 2002, and is already being accessed by over 100 different users, with more than 300 searches being completed each week.

MASCOT Software is used for protein identification and characterisation by matching mass spectrometry data against protein or nucleic acid sequence databases. Many of the most popular sequence databases used for this purpose are actually compiled at the NIH by the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

John Cottrell, co-founder of Matrix Science, said, "The initiative to set up this central resource is an endorsement of the growing importance of mass spectrometry based protein identification. We are very pleased that a growing community of NIH researchers will benefit from using MASCOT in their work."

About Matrix Science

Matrix Science has developed a niche market with bioinformatics products and services in the fields of mass spectrometry and proteomics. Currently one of the hottest areas of life science research, proteomics studies the entire protein make-up of a cell to determine which proteins are linked to certain diseases. In recent years, mass spectrometry has become the method of choice for protein identification and characterisation, analysing large numbers of samples at high speed. Matrix Science has distribution agreements with several leading mass spectrometer manufacturers, and Mascot has been licensed by nine out of the ten largest pharmaceutical companies as listed in Scrip's 2000 Pharmaceutical Company League Tables. Further information can be found on the Matrix Science web site at www.matrixscience.com

LabVantage Solutions^™ to Enter into Marketing Agreement with Matrix Science for Streamlined Protein Identification

LabVantage Sapphire Informatics plans to provide seamless integration with Mascot^® Mass Spectrometry-based Protein Identification

BOSTON, MA, August 5, 2002 - LabVantage Solutions, Inc., a leading provider of Discovery Lifecycle LIMS and Enterprise LIMS solutions, and Matrix Science, the market leader in protein identification software, announced today a marketing agreement to integrate Sapphire Informatics with Mascot at the Drug Discovery Technology 2002 conference.

MASCOT^® Software, Matrix Science's lead product, is a software suite for protein identification that enables mass spectrometry (MS) data to be rapidly matched against protein or nucleic acid sequence databases. The search engine is ideal for high-throughput applications and closed loop automation.

"This relationship addresses the needs of proteomics labs that are looking for a powerful off-the-shelf solution to integrate and automate their protein identification workflow," said Director of Matrix Science John Cottrell. "I look forward to a successful relationship with LabVantage Solutions."

"The strength of LabVantage Sapphire Informatics is in its ability to act as the information hub for researchers across various disciplines of discovery. This newly formed relationship will provide Sapphire customers with a means to quickly search their mass spec data with Mascot's Peptide Mass Fingerprint search, MS/MS Ions search or Sequence queries," said LabVantage's Director of Global Informatics Marketing Joe Peden.

LabVantage Sapphire^™ Informatics

Sapphire Informatics is a professionally developed and supported Discovery LIMS solution designed to help researchers integrate, automate and manage their business and discovery-related research processes to bring science to market faster. Sapphire connects multiple, dissimilar data sources into a logical, scalable, high-performance framework for scientific and business decision-making. Sapphire uses a browser-based interface to greatly simplify the education process for end users. Key functional elements of LabVantage Sapphire Informatics:

• Works as a scalable information hub with seamless integration to leading analytical solutions.
• Provides assay design and array management with compound management capabilities.
• Reduces manual tasks through process automation.
• Supports regulatory requirements such as 21 CFR Part 11.

About Matrix Science

Matrix Science has developed a niche market with bioinformatics products and services in the fields of mass spectrometry and proteomics. Currently one of the hottest areas of life science research, proteomics studies the entire protein make-up of a cell to determine which proteins are linked to certain diseases. In recent years, mass spectrometry has become the method of choice for protein identification and characterization, analyzing large numbers of samples at high speed. Matrix Science has distribution agreements with several leading mass spectrometer manufacturers, and Mascot has been licensed by nine out of the ten largest pharmaceutical companies as listed in Scrip's 2000 Pharmaceutical Company League Tables. Further information can be found on the Matrix Science web site at www.matrixscience.com.

About LabVantage

LabVantage Solutions, a Chatterjee Group company, is the leader in Discovery Lifecycle LIMS and Enterprise LIMS solutions. LabVantage helps customers reach beyond the traditional four walls of the laboratory with solutions that enable information sharing via intranets and extranets. LabVantage has data management and information production software for high throughput screening, genomics, proteomics and traditional manufacturing QA/QC. LabVantage products stand out in the areas of: workflow process automation, open database modeling, and integration of multiple data sources into a single browser interface. The company also offers services that ensure customer success, such as industry and technology consulting, implementation services, application training, and extensive customer support services. For further information about LabVantage Solutions, please visit our web site at www.labvantage.com.

Mascot Proteomics Software Ported to IBM's AIX Operating System

Matrix Science today announced that Mascot^®, the market leader in protein identification software, is now available for IBM's AIX^® 5L UNIX operating system. Porting to AIX was a joint effort between London based Matrix Science and IBM's Chemistry and Life Sciences Solutions Development Division, in Poughkeepsie NY.

Mascot enables protein identification using mass spectrometry data, a core technology in proteomics. The search procedure is data-intensive, requiring extensive statistical calculations to be performed while streaming through very large sequence databases, such as dbEST or the draft assembly of the human genome.

AIX 5L provides an open, standards based UNIX operating environment that is supported by a range of IBM eServer pSeries systems from entry-level servers and workstations through to powerful clusters and supercomputers.

"We are delighted to have an AIX version of Mascot," said David Creasy, Technical Director of Matrix Science. "AIX is both robust and scalable, providing an ideal platform for high throughput proteomics studies. Our customers are searching data sets containing hundreds or even thousands of mass spectra against multi-gigabyte sequence databases. To keep pace with the rate at which modern instruments generate data, it is essential for the workload to be efficiently distributed across multiple, fast processors."

As part of its support for pSeries systems, Mascot has been tested on IBM's powerful p690, code named Regatta, which features IBM's innovative system-on-a-chip design, with each chip containing two one-gigahertz-plus processors, a large memory cache and I/O interconnected with other components using a new high performance distributed switch design.

"AIX running on IBM eServer pSeries systems provides the scalability and performance needed to power the complex searches and data-intensive operations required by Matrix Science's Mascot mass spectrometry application," said Kristian Thyregod, vice president, product marketing, IBM eServer pSeries.

About IBM pSeries and AIX 5L

IBM eServer pSeries servers run AIX 5L, the industry's most open UNIX operating environment. AIX provides increased levels of integration, flexibility and reliability essential for meeting the high demands of today's e-business applications. The operating system is fully integrated to support existing 32- and 64-bit hardware systems in their full range of scalability, with key internet technologies such as Java included as part of the base operating system. A strong affinity between AIX and Linux permits popular applications developed on Linux to run on AIX with a simple recompilation. For more information, visit http://www.ibm.com/servers.

About Matrix Science

Matrix Science has developed a niche market with bioinformatics products and services in the fields of mass spectrometry and proteomics. Currently one of the hottest areas of life science research, proteomics studies the entire protein make-up of a cell to determine which proteins are linked to certain diseases. In recent years, mass spectrometry has become the method of choice for protein identification and characterisation, analysing large numbers of samples at high speed. Matrix Science has distribution agreements with several leading mass spectrometer manufacturers, and Mascot has been licensed by nine out of the ten largest pharmaceutical companies as listed in Scrip's 2000 Pharmaceutical Company League Tables. Further information can be found on the Matrix Science web site at http://www.matrixscience.com/

Mascot is a registered trademark of Matrix Science Limited. All other company, product and service names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

Matrix Science Announces an OEM Agreement with Applied Biosystems to Distribute MASCOT^® Software for Mass Spectrometry-Based Protein Identification

Matrix Science today announced a non-exclusive distribution agreement with Applied Biosystems Group (NYSE: ABI), an Applera Corporation business. The agreement covers the use of Matrix Science's MASCOT^® software for mass spectrometry-based protein identification and characterisation.

MASCOT^® Software, Matrix Science's lead product, is a software suite for protein identification that enables mass spectrometry (MS) data to be rapidly matched against protein or nucleic acid sequence databases. The search engine is ideal for high-throughput applications and closed loop automation. It is intended to implement seamless integration between the MASCOT software search engine and the software packages used for Applied Biosystems/MDS SCIEX QSTAR^TM Pulsar system instrument control and data acquisition-Analyst^TM and BioAnalyst^TM software. The QSTAR^TM Pulsar systems provide high quality MS and MS/MS data when coupled to on-line capillary HPLC separations and with discrete sample analysis using the Ion Spray or NanoSpray^TM ion sources. Mass spectrometry is currently the method of choice for performing protein analysis.

John Cottrell, Director of Matrix Science said, "I am delighted with this vote of confidence in our technology and look forward to a successful relationship with Applied Biosystems."

"MASCOT software has been widely adopted by many researchers in the field proteomics and has developed an excellent reputation," said Mark Allen, Director of Proteomics for LC/MS products for Applied Biosystems. "With this agreement we can now provide seamless integration of MASCOT software to our QSTAR Pulsar system, a feature that many of our customers have requested."

Matrix Science, a privately held company established in 1998, has formed a niche market with software products and services in the fields of mass spectrometry and proteomics. Further information on MASCOT^® software can be found on the Matrix Science web site at http://www.matrixscience.com/releases.html

About Applera Corporation
Applera Corporation, formerly PE Corporation, comprises two operating groups. The Applied Biosystems Group develops and markets instrument-based systems, reagents, software, and contract services to the life science industry and research community. Customers use these tools to analyze nucleic acids (DNA and RNA), small molecules, and proteins to make scientific discoveries, leading to the development of new pharmaceuticals, and to conduct standardized testing. Applied Biosystems is headquartered in Foster City, CA, and reported sales of $1.4 billion during fiscal 2000. The Celera Genomics Group (NYSE: CRA), headquartered in Rockville, MD, intends to become the definitive source of genomic and related medical information. Information about the company, including reports and other information filed by the company with the Securities and Exchange Commission, is available on the World Wide Web at www.applera.com or by telephoning 800.762.6923.

Matrix Science Announces Mascot License Agreement with Geneva Proteomics

Bioinformatics company Matrix Science (London) today confirmed that its protein identification software, Mascot, has been selected by Geneva Proteomics, Inc., as the initial search engine for GeneProt's first industrial scale proteomics factory, located in Switzerland. Mascot is a software suite for protein identification, which enables data from mass spectrometers to be rapidly matched against protein or nucleic acid databases. The search engine is designed for high-throughput spectrum screening and closed loop automation, and search results can be imported into a database for data mining processes.

Mascot has the ability to run on all mainstream computing platforms (Tru64 Unix, Irix, Linux, Solaris, and Microsoft Windows) while accepting data from all the major types of mass spectrometers.

"GeneProt's decision to select our software for its Geneva facility underscores Matrix Science's expertise in this field," said John Cottrell, Director of Matrix Science. "I am delighted with this vote of confidence in our technology and look forward to a successful business relationship with GeneProt."

Matrix Science has licensing agreements with several leading suppliers of mass spectrometers for use of Mascot as part of an integrated instrument and processing package. The company has also licensed the search engine for in-house use by some 60% of the world's top 30 pharmaceutical companies.

BioVisioN and Matrix Science Announce Strategic Collaboration to Develop Bioinformatics Software

BioVisioN, the Hannover-based biotechnology company, and Matrix Science, the London-based bioinformatics specialist, have agreed on a long-term strategic alliance to develop bioinformatics software. The two companies will combine their cutting-edge technologies in human peptide research and software for protein identification to greatly increase the ability of biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies to turn data generated from protein research into concrete clinical applications.

BioVisioN is the market leader in peptidomics, the application of human peptide research to the diagnosis and treatment of diseases. BioVisioN's expertise is the identification of previously unknown human peptides (small proteins) and their relationship to diseases such as Alzheimer's, degenerative arthritis, and various types of cancer. By combining BioVisioN's research strength with Matrix Science's leadership in bioinformatics, the two companies will develop software tools that will identify clinically relevant peptides faster, more efficiently, and at lower cost.

Michael Schrader, co-CEO of BioVisioN, said: "Human peptides and proteins are a tremendous untapped source of candidates for the diagnosis and treatment of disease. The strategic alliance between BioVisioN and Matrix Science will revolutionise the way our two companies and their clients can turn this research into concrete results for medical applications." The first joint project involves the development of a new bioinformatics tool that greatly facilitates the generation of molecular data from biological samples and their subsequent evaluation. Already underway, the project uses sophisticated methods of mass spectrometry and data base research.

BioVisioN GmbH & Co. KG is an independent, venture-capital-financed biotechnology company based in Hannover, Germany. Founded in 1997 by Michael Schrader and Peter Schulz-Knappe, the company now has 30 employees. Major research partners include Applied Biosystems and Roche Diagnostics. Matrix Science Ltd. is a privately held bioinformatics company based in London, England. The company was established in 1998 by David Creasy and John Cottrell to provide software products and services in the fields of mass spectrometry and proteomics. The founders have extensive experience in the scientific software and analytical instruments industries.

Launch Of Mascot Protein Identification Software

Imperial Cancer Research Fund research is to be made freely available on the world-wide web with the launch of new software produced by Matrix Science Ltd.

Matrix Science, the London-based bioinformatics company, in collaboration with the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, has launched Mascot, a powerful search engine which uses mass spectrometry data to identify proteins from primary sequence databases.

Mascot, which represents a great leap forward in the field of protein sequence software, will be freely available on the world-wide web - it can also be purchased for in-house use, with a share of the profits going to the Imperial Cancer Research Fund. The software combines all proven methods of searching, including peptide mass fingerprint, sequence query and MS/MS ions search.

John Cottrell, a director of Matrix Science, said: "Mass spectrometry is now the principal method for the characterisation of proteins. Pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies need to identify very large numbers of protein samples at high speed and with minimum cost. This demand will mushroom as proteomics moves out of the research laboratory and into clinical applications."

"The process of screening mass spectrometry data against the hundreds of thousands of entries in the major sequence databases has proved to be a major bottleneck. Mascot aims to eliminate this bottleneck through greater processing speed, increased functionality, and novel, probability-based algorithms which allow the identification process to be fully automated."

Matrix Science Ltd has taken the software devised by Dr Darryl Pappin, head of the Protein Sequencing Laboratory at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, and developed it as a product which can be used by academics and researchers around the world. Researchers can gain free, unrestricted access to Mascot through the Matrix Science web site (www.matrixscience.com)

Dr Pappin said: "It's crucial that cancer research scientists can rapidly characterise the proteins that are involved in the different forms of cancer. By understanding the structure of these proteins we may be able to design and target anti-cancer drugs more effectively. It is important to an institution like Imperial Cancer Research Fund that such software is made freely available to other researchers around the world."