Paragraf USA (Cardea Bio)

Scientists at DARPA, Siemens, US ARMY, Georgia Tech Research Institute, and Paragraf - through recently acquired Cardea Bio, now Paragraf San Diego - presented novel multiomics capabilities, by detection of both protein and RNA biosignals simultaneously on a single graphene-based biosensor.

Dr. Kiana Aran, Chief Innovation Officer at Paragraf San Diego, stated: “Having a single technology platform that can detect both protein and DNA/RNA biosignal analytes at the same time on a small-scale detection device, is a major technological advancement. While it initially will impact when and where we can detect viral infections, with time it will also work for other types of diseases. This will enable new, better, and way faster diagnoses for any types of diseases or biothreats.”

DARPA, Siemens, the U.S ARMY, Georgia Tech Research Institute and Paragraf - through recently acquired Cardea Bio, now Paragraf San Diego - have presented novel multiomics capabilities, by detection of both protein and RNA biosignals simultaneously on a single graphene-based biosensor.

It was stated that this achievement marks the first public demonstration of this novel methodology for multiomics and that the paper is the first in the world demonstrating the capability to detect both protein and RNA biosignals in a COVID-19 based experiment where both the COVID wild type as well as the Omicron variant were successfully detected.

UK-based Paragraf has acquired U.S-based Cardea Bio, maker of graphene biosensors. Cardea Bio has been renamed Paragraf USA and Michael Heltzen, CEO and co-founder of Cardea Bio, became EVP of Strategy at Paragraf USA.

“Joining Paragraf allows us to use the world’s only mass-produced, transfer-free monolayer graphene to manufacture the state-of-the art graphene-based biosensors developed by the Cardea team over the last ten years. We are looking forward to unlocking powerful synergistic effects to advance the broad and growing use of graphene biosensors for the benefit of both people and the planet,” says Heltzen.

Specialty chemicals company Mito Material Solutions  and Cardea Bio recently announced significant progress in the international efforts to standardize graphene together with the National Institute of Standards (NIST). Brett Goldsmith, PhD, chief technology officer (CTO) at Cardea, recently returned from the International Standards Organization (ISO) meeting that took place at the UK's National Physical Laboratory (NPL), during which graphene material documentary standards reportedly took important steps forward.

“We see a bright future for diagnostic tools based on graphene electronics, but we’re not waiting for that future — we’re making it happen!” Goldsmith says. “Part of that means driving reliability and predictability in the graphene material industry. That’s why we are committed to supporting the Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to ISO TC 229.”

This is a guest-post by Jeffrey Draa, CEO at Grolltex - producing graphene biosensors on silicon chips today shows low yields, high cost and restrictive packaging options, limiting scalability and market penetration. But optimization may be here.

Monolayer, electronics grade graphene is propelling advanced biosensing in many key areas. Google the search term, ‘graphene biosensor’, and one will see thousands of next-generation, life enhancing applications being refined in research labs worldwide. This one atom thick material is creating biosensing and detection performance in speed and sensitivity not possible before. Areas such as cancer and virus detection, new drug discovery, genomics, allergens, glucose and many more are starting to see unimagined advances. By far, the number 1 use case for monolayer graphene films today is atomic level biosensing.

Cardea Bio, a biotech company integrating molecular biology with semiconductor electronics, has signed a commercial partnership with Scentian Bio. Scentian is an expert in synthetic insect odorant receptors (iORs), one of nature’s ways of detecting and interpreting smells.

The partnership will enable Scentian to use a customized Cardean chipset, built with graphene-based biology-gated transistors, which will allow Scentian to manufacture a bio-electronic tongue/nose tech platform.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) recently awarded the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) an agreement, as part of their SenSARS program, to develop a sensing platform to detect airborne SARS-CoV-2 particles. Cardea Bio is a sub-contractor to this agreement.

This agreement will enable the two institutions to develop a real-time pathogen identification technology that can be applied to many different defense and civilian environmental monitoring applications.

Cardea Bio, Inc., U.S-based manufacturer of a biology-enabled transistor technology made from graphene-based biosensors, recently raised $6.5 Million in a series A extension that brings its A round total above $20M.

The new capital infusion is led by the life sciences and biotechnology focused investor 3E Bioventures Capital and joined by existing investors. Proceeds from the financing will be used to further develop Cardea’s proprietary Transistor platform, in order to significantly expand mass-manufacturing and further grow Cardea’s number of commercial partnerships.

Following a $7.8 Million Series A-1 financing announced in March 2019, Cardea, (formerly called Nanomedical Diagnostics), a U.S-based manufacturer of a biology-enabled transistor technology made from graphene-based biosensors, now announced another $7.5 Million raised in the Series A2 Financing.

The capital will help accelerate the growth and development of the Company’s proprietary Tech+Bio Infrastructure and chipsets that enable Cardea’s Innovation Partners to bring Powered by Cardea" products to market with features and competitive advantages Cardea defines as "never seen before".

Cardea Bio (formerly: Nanomedical Diagnostics) and Nanosens Innovations have joined forces to accelerate the development of the Genome Sensor: the world's first DNA search engine that runs on CRISPR-Chip technology.

Cardea has announced the finalization of their merger-acquisition of Nanosens Innovations, the creators of CRISPR-Chip. Cardea first came out with the news of the proposed merger in September, along with the announcement of their Early Access Program for the Genome Sensor. Built with CRISPR-Chip technology, the Genome Sensor is the world’s first DNA search engine. It can google genomes to detect genetic mutations and variations.