Partnering

In recent collaborations with key thought leaders Celula has demonstrated the power of its technology.

These collaborative studies show how it can be extended to multiple future applications including:

· Stem and other rare cells from a variety of tissues can be labeled during development or disease progression allowing isolation and characterization

· Individual variation can also be studied where only pooled cell sources could previously be used

· For the first time, the origins of various tissues can be studied at nearly the single cell level

· Isolation of rare cells for autologous therapies

Celula welcomes overtures from similarly qualified institutions and researchers for commercial and research application.

Some current collaborations include:

THE SALK INSTITUTE

Celula is collaborating with widely recognized researchers at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California enabling them to utilize the original Celula device, the Celulator, to advance their work with rare cells in unique ways. Traditional approaches cannot isolate these cells in high purity for practical studies, while populations as low as several hundred to a few thousand fragile cells from a single experimental subject are opening doors to novel inquires in these laboratories:

Satchin Panda—Hypothalamic “circadian clock” Neurons

GFP expressing neurons from the Suprachiasmatic Nucleus (SCN) of the hypothalamus, which constitute the master “circadian clock” from single animals are analyzed by quantitative RT-PCR for gene expression over the course of a day.

Geoff Wahl—Breast Stem Cell/Oncogenesis

Cells temporarily labeled with GFP (less than 500-1000 in number) from a single developing mammary gland in mouse are sorted to define a candidate breast stem cell subset which may be recovered and transplanted to assess potential for development into breast epithelium.

CELULA SIGNED AN AGREEMENT TO JOINTLY SPONSOR UNIVERSITY RESEARCH ON MICROFLUIDIC INSTRUMENTATION

On August 8, 2007, Celula Inc., a startup company based in San Diego, California, has signed an agreement to support University of California, San Diego (UCSD) for a research program (grant HR0011-04-0032) titled as “Automated Microfluidic Flow Cytometry and Cell Sorting”. The program is jointly sponsored by Celula Inc. and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) under RA 03-37 DARPA University Photonics Research (UPR) program. The principal investigators in UCSD are Professor Yeshaiahu Fainman and Assistant Professor Alex Groisman.

The program will fund researchers at UC San Diego and Celula Inc. to continue improving the functionalities on a Celula proprietary microfluidic flow cell sorting system utilizing the optofluidics technology being developed by researchers within the Center for Optofluidic Integration supported by DARPA’s UPR program. Professor Fainman is also a Director of the Center for Optofluidic Integration supported by DARPA’s UPR program. The research could lead to a miniature flow cytometer and cell sorter with a high level of automation, which is suitable for battle field bio-detection and point-of-care diagnostics.

Collaborations