Intellectual Property

The Bio-Works company has unique access to cutting edge intellectual property. This IP is focussed on agarose-based micro-spheres, or beads, that make up the type of separation media that dominates research and industrial scale protein chromatography today.

Higher Bead Rigidity

The rigidity of the agarose beads is vital if compression is to be avoided under high flow rate methodologies. Bio-Works has licensed IP for a new cross-linking technology that results in a bead rigidity that is several times higher than current products on the market. This allows for the use of very high flow rates and therefore  large volumes of fluid may be processed more economically than by using conventional methods.

Novel Coupling Mechanism

Customers often require the flexibility to attach their own ligands to the agarose beads. These ligands are used as specific capture agents for target molecules that are flowing past them in the fluid feed-stream. It is therefore important to the customer that the mechanism of attachment of the ligands to the beads is stable and simple to achieve. Bio-Works has licensed a newly granted patent covering a novel methodology to enable the customer to attach the ligand of their choice via a simple chemical step. It will now be easier to get consistent, stable ligand attachment; a distinct advantage over competitor offerings.

On-going patent applications

Bio-Works has finalized submission of two patents, one covering improved Agarose production and another a new Agarose-based media designed specifically for the food and beverage markets.