NRGene and Macrogen Launch Unltra-High-Density SNP Genotyping Service

NRGene and Macrogen Corp announced today the launch of a joint sequencing-based genotyping service, ArrayMAGIC, at the Plant and Animal Genome (PAG) conference in San Diego. The new offering provides ultra-high-density single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotyping at a low cost per datapoint, making this valuable technology more accessible for a wide range of agricultural applications.

The new service is designed to make high-quality SNP genotyping affordable and available as needed. ArrayMAGIC customers will benefit from a simple, yet comprehensive “tissue to knowledge” experience, tapping into the expertise of all three participating companies. To streamline the process, a dedicated website will be launched to advise customers on how to send samples to Macrogen Corp. A novel, cost-effective sequencing library prep method, provided by iGenomX, is employed to create an ultra-low coverage sequence dataset for each sample. NRGene then leverages its extensive proprietary database and analytical tools to impute a high-resolution SNP set from this data.

“ArrayMAGIC is unprecedented, in that it combines the technology and capabilities of NRGene, Macrogen, and iGenomX, yielding a superior service for high-throughput genotyping at a low cost” said Guy Kol, NRGene’s Senior Vice President, Product and Strategic Alliances. “It will initially be available for use on soy and maize, but we’re working hard to expand to more organisms later this year.”

As global demand for food continues to rise, scientific advances are needed to maximize agricultural production. Understanding the genomic make-up and trait-specific SNP markers of crops and livestock is an important part of the solution. However, a high-quality product can be prohibitively expensive for smaller businesses or for less established crop and animal programs.

“Clients have come to trust Macrogen, NRGene, and iGenomX in their respective areas of expertise,” said Ryan Kim, the CEO of Macrogen Corp. “By bringing these foundational genomic companies together to create a one-stop solution to screening the entire genome, clients will have access to extremely high quality genotyping at a fraction of the cost of whole genome sequencing. This collaboration will surely further the optimization of sequencing-based genotyping tool for researchers.”