Oxford Nanopore Technologies
Oxford Nanopore Technologies plc is a UK-based company which develops and sells nanopore sequencing products for the direct, electronic analysis of single molecules. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.
History
The company was founded in 2005 as a spin-out from the University of Oxford by Hagan Bayley, Gordon Sanghera, and Spike Willcocks, with seed funding from the IP Group. The company made an initial public offering on the London Stock Exchange on 30 September 2021, under the ticker ONT.In March 2016 the company announced a chemistry upgrade to its nanopore sequencing product 'R9', using a protein nanopore in collaboration with the laboratory of Han Remaut. The company stated in a webcast that R9 is designed to improve error rates and yield.
In July 2016, a MinION nanopore sequencer was included on the ninth NASA/SpaceX commercial cargo resupply services mission to the International Space Station. The aim of the mission was to provide proof of concept for the MinION's functionality in a microgravity environment. During the mission, ISS crew members successfully sequenced DNA from bacteria, bacteriophage and rodents from samples prepared on Earth. Maintaining the MinION device as a research facility on the space station holds the potential to support a number of additional science investigations, any of which could have Earth based applications.
Products
The main products of Oxford Nanopore are:- MinION: this harmonica-sized portable protein nanopore sequencing USB device has been commercially available since May 2015 after having been launched initially through an early access program, the MinION Access Program.
- GridION X5: this desktop device has been commercially available since March 2017. The device processes up to five MinION Flow Cells and enables generation of up to 100 Gb of data per run.
- PromethION: this desktop, high throughput device will be available through an access program that opened for registration in July 2015. The device contains channels for 144,000 nanopores.
- VolTRAX: this device is designed for automated library preparation so that users do not need a laboratory or lab skills to run the device. Registration for the early access program was opened in October 2016.
- Metrichor: this spinout company from Oxford Nanopore was set up to provide end to end solutions for biological analyses, using nanopore sensing technologies.
- SmidgION: a mobile phone sequencer announced in May 2016, currently in development.