Illumina and bioMérieux to Pinpoint Pathogens with Next Gen Sequencing

By Bio-IT World Staff 

November 19, 2014 | BioMérieux, a French-headquartered biotech specializing in diagnostics and microbe detection, has announced a partnership with sequencing giant Illumina to create next generation sequencing (NGS) tests for tracking pathogens. Illumina will optimize the tests for its MiSeq instrument, while bioMérieux will lend its database of over 80,000 microbial genomes as a reference for identifying organisms. The partner companies say their first product will help hospitals follow infections and local outbreaks in near-real time, enabled by the MiSeq’s quick sample turnaround and a cloud computing environment for matching DNA sequences to specific pathogens. BioMérieux’s library also includes virulence and antibiotic resistance genes, providing vital information for controlling outbreaks.

The solution will be deployed in service labs, which will receive samples from hospitals and return standardized reports. As such, it is meant to be used on a macro level to track infections, and not as a tool for diagnosing specific patients. However, it’s worth noting that a modified MiSeq, the MiSeqDx, has been cleared by the FDA for use in other diagnostic tests, and this partnership with bioMérieux could lay the foundation for an eventual NGS-based infectious disease diagnostic.

In addition to its diagnostic tests, bioMérieux also provides microbial screening tests for pharmaceutical and agricultural companies — other potential markets for NGS solutions. Illumina, meanwhile, has engineered a rapid shift over the past year from being almost entirely a platform provider, to developing a diverse portfolio of in-house tests, in fields from rare disease to cancer. Increasingly, Illumina is interested in being an active participant in clinical uses for its instruments. Just today, for instance, the company announced a collaboration with USAID and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard to place MiSeqs in laboratories in Senegal, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, where they will be used to sequence samples from the Ebola epidemic in an effort to track the spread and evolutionary divergence of the virus.