Caliper Life Sciences Inc. announced that the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has awarded a contract to NovaScreen Biosciences, the in vitro discovery services arm of Caliper Discovery Alliances and Services (CDAS), to assist the agency in developing new approaches to identify toxic environmental chemicals.

The contract award, which was anticipated by Caliper, will range from $1.4 to $69 million over the course of two to five years. The specific dollar value within this range will be based primarily upon the volume of testing requested by the EPA and the availability of funds for future years.

As part of the EPA's ToxCast research program, CDAS will utilize biochemical and cellular assays, validated in the pharmaceutical drug discovery industry, to help predict how chemicals such as pesticides will interact with the environment, humans and animals. CDAS will leverage its state-of-the-art screening tools and its proprietary Side-Effect Database (SED), representing screening results from 2,300 compounds tested against more than 70 biological targets, to provide comprehensive laboratory testing and analysis services across a broad range of specific protein targets of interest to the EPA.

"A contract of this magnitude validates industry demand for CDAS; organizations require a reliable service-oriented provider of leading-edge technologies that delivers timely, high quality results," said Kevin Hrusovsky, CEO of Caliper Life Sciences. "Our work with the EPA is an extension of the services we successfully provide for our pharma and biotech customers."

"The EPA needed a partner to perform fast, accurate screening of a high volume of compounds and the technical expertise to help build relevant predictive datasets," said David Manyak, PhD, executive vice president of discovery services of Caliper Life Sciences. "CDAS was selected by the EPA, in a highly competitive award process, based on our superior technical proposal, data quality plan and value offering. We are gratified by this validation of our capabilities and excited to work with the EPA on this important programme that will result in a healthier, safer environment."

Caliper Discovery Alliances and Services (CDAS) is the newly formed services organization created from the integration of NovaScreen Biosciences, a provider of in vitro discovery services, and Xenogen Biosciences, a provider of in vivo discovery services. NovaScreen was acquired by Caliper in October 2005 and Xenogen was acquired by Caliper in August 2006.

CDAS provides a wide range of in vitro and in vivo products and services that enable pharmaceutical companies to reduce costs while increasing the pace and clinical relevance of drug research.