Integrated Genomics and National Renewable Energy Laboratory Enter into Metabolic Collaboration

CHICAGO, IL - September 25, 1998

Integrated Genomics, Inc. (IG) announced today that it entered into a research collaboration with Midwest Research Institute which manages the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), for the U.S. Department of Energy, concerning the metabolic engineering of bacterial ethanol producer Zymomonas mobilis. Under the terms of the agreement, IG will provide NREL maps of certain metabolic pathways of Z. mobilis, as well as quantitative models of optimization of the strain's intermediary metabolism.

Metabolic modeling and design is the focus of IG's research strategy, aiming to solve industrial problems, such as bacterial strain improvement, with genomics methods. IG's approach consists of sequence-based reconstruction of cellular metabolism followed by mathematical modeling and redesign of particular pathways. The models are to be applied for metabolic engineering of the strains. IG completed sequencing and metabolic reconstruction of the Z. mobilisgenome earlier this year. Z. mobilis, the bacterial alternative to yeast in ethanol production, is a long-term research interest of NREL.

"We are pleased to be collaborating with NREL in the exciting field of metabolic engineering", said Robert Haselkorn, President and Chairman of Integrated Genomics. "There are significant synergies between our metabolic bioinformatics capabilities and the expertise in strain construction and genetic engineering of Z. mobilis developed by NREL scientists. We consider this agreement an important milestone in the emergence of metabolic engineering as the mainstream technology in industrial microbiology".

About Integrated Genomics

Chicago, Illinois-based Integrated Genomics provides all levels of analysis of bacterial and fungal genomes, from high-throughput sequencing to sophisticated bioinformatics. The company is a leader in sequence-based metabolic reconstruction and modeling.

Contact:
Yuri Nikolski Ph.D.
Integrated Genomics
(312) 491-0846