Lucigen Corp. will receive a $200,000 low-interest loan from the state Commerce Department to develop a DNA sequencing technology, Gov. Jim Doyle said Thursday.
Founded in 1998 to develop life sciences research products, the Madison company has a $1.9 million research project aiming to reduce the time and cost of sequencing a living organism.
Lucigen is working to develop a product that would help researchers prepare DNA for sequencing more quickly than using existing methods.
There's a widespread effort in the scientific community to sequence the DNA of plants that are most important for producing food and other products. These plants' genomes are often much larger than the human genome. For example, wheat has one of the largest genomes.
"There's a window of opportunity now - probably within the next five years - most of these genomes will be sequenced will be done," said Jeff Williams, Lucigen's president.
Lucigen's core technology helps researchers make multiple copies of genes that have historically been difficult to clone. The company generates most of its revenue from selling molecular cloning tools to research facilities.