Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE: A) today announced that the University of Liverpool's Centre for Genomic Research has become the UK's first Certified Service Provider for the Agilent SureSelect Target Enrichment System for next-generation sequencing. The CGR has been conducting research at the leading edge of genomic technologies and data analysis in Liverpool, England, for over a decade. With a diverse portfolio of projects including metagenomics, plant and animal studies, cancer genomics and human genetics, the CGR is constantly exploring new technologies and making innovative approaches and applications available to researchers investigating fundamental and applied biology. SureSelect has been shown to greatly increase the speed and efficiency of next-generation sequencing by enabling researchers to focus experiments on genomic regions of interest rather than sequencing the entire genome. Since it was introduced in 2009, SureSelect has been instrumental in more than 250 published studies covering research into a wide range of heritable disorders and complex diseases. "We have relied on SureSelect in our research efforts to produce consistent results that we and our collaborators can be confident in," said professor Andy Cossins, head of the Institute of Integrative Biology and co-director of the Centre for Genomic Research. "Achieving certified status is an important step for the CGR and will allow us to expand our sequencing leadership." "The CGR is a highly regarded collaborator in the sequencing community, and we're pleased that they are now enabling more researchers across the UK to access the market-leading platform for target enrichment," said Kathleen Shelton, senior director of Genomics Marketing at Agilent. "Their certification is a great complement for our SureSelect portfolio and will be a great benefit to collaborators." To be certified, the CGR participated in comprehensive on-site training and then passed a rigorous set of requirements to demonstrate expertise and skill. The SureSelect portfolio now includes more than 21 products, and many more are in development. SureSelect is compatible with major sequencing platforms such as Illumina, SOLiD and 454. Users of Agilent's eArray design tool can improve the efficiency of their research by easily designing custom products to target any genomic regions of interest. SureSelect also allows customization of catalog kits with the addition of custom content.

About CGR

The Centre for Genomic Research is a high-throughput sequencing facility that has been operating as a full service centre for genomic sciences, providing infrastructure as well as analytical and technical expertise to the wider research community for more than 12 years. In an increasingly dynamic marketplace for next-generation sequencing, the CGR provides advice, data generation, analysis and interpretation, all in a collaborative, question-driven environment. A commitment to research excellence is reflected in the CGR's collaborations with basic, applied and commercial research organizations addressing diverse research themes such as personalized medicine, cancer genomics and transcriptomics, pathogen discovery and population structures, metagenomics as well as plant and livestock genomics.

About Agilent in Genomics

Agilent Technologies Inc. is a global leader in target enrichment for next-generation sequencing and genomic microarrays. The Agilent SureSelect and HaloPlex target enrichment systems enable researchers to easily choose which segments of a genome to sequence, avoiding the time and expense needed to sequence the entire genome. HaloPlex and its same day sample-to-sequencer workflow is well suited for next-gen desktop sequencers, whereas SureSelect's ability to accurately capture whole exomes and whole methylomes in a single reaction pairs well with high-throughput next-gen sequencing systems. These are just two products arising from Agilent's expertise in synthesizing custom complex mixtures of long oligonucleotides gained in microarray manufacturing. Additional product lines built on this core technology include microarrays for genome-wide measurement of gene expression and for comparative genomics hybridization, as well as SureFISH, a highly specific and sensitive product line for oligonucleotide flourescent in situ hybridization. In addition to oligonucleotide-based products, Agilent offers a microfluidic bioanlyzer to measure sample quality, a target-enrichment tool to speed next-gen sequencing, and a full set of reagents, hardware, methods and bioinformatics software for genomic experiments.