Allele Will Receive Its 3rd US Patent On RNAi

On December 1st, 2009 Allele Biotech will be granted its 3rd US patent on using RNA polymerase III (Pol III) for creating RNAi inside mammalian cells. Previously, US patent 7,294,504 was granted to Allele Biotech that covers commercial kits with DNA template components designed for expression of shRNA, miRNA, or siRNA; US patent 7,422,896 further granted claims covering broader designs of using a Pol III promoter such as a U6 promoter for RNAi, including the use of a constitutive or inducible enhancer. The current US patent 7,625,750, protects the use of above technologies in conjunction with arrays, particularly addressable, high density DNA arrays. The RNAi encoding DNA molecules, anchored to the surface through a special peptide, can be transduced via transduction peptide into target cells grown on the array surface. The DNA will then be released from the surface after the completion of DNA transfer by a membrane protease. "This array format for RNAi using the Pol III technology should have higher efficiency and controllability than soft agar embedded siRNAs for transfecting cells, with great potential in large-scale RNAi functional screening and validation. Combined with Allele Biotech’s existing lentiviral vector-based shRNA platform, the addressable RNAi arrays provide us with the best methods available for RNAi screening”, said Dr. Jiwu Wang, CEO of Allele Biotech and the inventor of the patent.



Allele Biotech provides reagent kits and custom services from using its patented technologies in the field of RNAi. The 3 patents issued to Allele Biotech within the past 2 years are so far the only US patents on the methods and compositions of using Pol III promoter for expressing dsRNA-mediated gene silencing. Allele Biotech aims to strengthen its market position by providing superior products and services while actively protecting its intellectual properties. The current strategy includes noting providers and users of existing products that apparently fall under Allele’s patent protection in order to provide reasonable sub-licensing or co-development options.



Allele Biotech is expanding its RNAi capabilities by incorporating the Pol III promoter-driven shRNA cassettes into its popular Phoenix retroviral system and the recently added lentiviral vector system. The RNAi service will also be integrated with Allele’s viral packaging service which offers the best value in terms of per viral particle cost in the market today. High throughput and high content screenings to be conducted at Allele could be further aided by the use of low mutation oligo annealing and wall-less cell array technologies by collaborating with partner companies. In addition, RNAi target design and selection are carried out with an advanced algorism and the most effective empirical rules through Allele’s RNAi services.



Allele Biotech's RNAi technologies were developed with help from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) through several grants. The research team at Allele is currently applying for another NIH project to use these technologies in synthetic lethal screening for cancer therapy. Dr. Wang said that "It is now our goal as well as responsibility to make the RNAi technologies helpful to as many researchers as possible in their pursuit of the best results from gene function studies”.

Fireworks and Music as Czechs Commemorated

Words that will become quotes:

"Many of our citizens who took part in the democratic changes died already with a feeling that they contributed to something that meant a lot," Havel said Tuesday. "In our ordinary, daily lives, we tend to forget our friends of that time -- our comrades, free-thinking individuals."

How many of us can have that feeling?

Allele Biotech Pre-Announces its Product Line in iPSC Creation Using Baculoviral Vectors

As a new approach of establishing novel product lines and generating feedbacks and potential interests early on, Allele Biotech has started disclosing its intended/ongoing research plan on AlleleBlogs or through AlleleNews. This week, Allele Biotech has listed the main points that it intends to accomplish by developing a baculovirus-based iPS cell generating system to complement its existing lentiviral and retroviral vector systems for iPSCs. The plan was part of a grant proposal presented to the NIH during the stimulus grant rounds in mid-2009. There has also been interest on relevant service from Allele Biotech’s customers. The time for market launch is expected to be by the end of this year.

Allele Biotech R&D team welcomes any suggestions and discussions on the research plan and the resulting products. Comments can be made at the blog, through comments on this news, or directly to us through emails.

Take advantage of the brightest GFP for studying gene expression regulations

As most Allele’s customers and website visitors already know, mWasabi is the brightest green fluorescent protein. Unlike commonly used EGFP, mWasabi is a true monomer that does not have the tendency to associate with each other even at high concentrations. It has been validated as an efficient tag in more than 20 fusions located in different cellular compartments.

For studying factors that regulate mammalian gene expression, enzymes such luciferase and lacZ are traditionally used as reporters when operationally linked to promoters and enhancers. Fluorescent proteins are becoming more and more popular for such applications as instruments for reading fluorescence emitted from treated cells are becoming more available. Using fluorescent proteins as reporter eliminates the need for performing enzyme reactions with assay substrate kits. More importantly, fluorescence readings can be taken at any time point on LIVE cells.

Allele Biotech introduces to the market a set of gene expression reporter constructs based on mWasabi and its cyan relative mTFP1, as the new product of the week of 11/09/09 to 11/15/09. Choosing different versions within this vector group, promoters, enhancers, or DNA binding protein binding sites can be easily inserted and their effects of gene expression compared to those of controls.

Promotion of the week: Lentiviral particles expressing commonly used human cytokines at one-time discount.

News article in AlleleNews (to be published Thursday): Using GFP-tag in Immunoprecipitation to study DNA repair pathway factors.

Berlin Wall fell 20 years ago

Read the following writing by Chinese Author 北明:
"１９８９年的最后一天，东、西柏林万人空巷，１９８９年的最后一夜，勃兰登堡门两面，灯火通明，万头躜动。１９８９年的最后一刻，当深色天幕上，礼炮齐鸣，彩花争艳时，人们在欢乐的海洋中奏乐起舞，喜极而泣，仰面沉思、干杯痛饮。两德人民和来自世界各地的游人一齐，在勃兰登堡门迎来了德国历史上的一个新世纪。" Only 6 months earlier young blood was spilling instead of beer and wine. It was the blood of my peers, my neighbors, my friends that awakened some humanity in East German solders and commanders who did not pull the trigger 20 years ago. I feel saddened and proud at the same time. As the saying goes:"Evils prevail when good people do nothing."