Takara Bio Inc. (president and CEO: Ikunoshin Kato, Ph.D.) will begin sales of a kit for detecting carbapenem-resistant bacteria through its distributor Medca Japan Co., Ltd. (President: Yutaka Kannari) on November 18. The kit amplifies genes resistant to Carbapenum using Takara Bio's original isothermal gene-amplification method (ICAN^TM), and then detects these genes using gold nanoparticles.

Carbapenem, an antibiotic, is the best way to combat bacteria that have acquired resistance to conventional antibiotics. The use of Carbapenum has increased rapidly over the past few years - particularly in Japan, which accounts for half of all Carbapenum use worldwide.

As the Carbapenum use increased, the spread of carbapenem-resistant bacteria has also become a serious problem. This resistance is caused when certain bacteria begin to produce an enzyme called 'Metallo Beta-Lactamase' that degrades the antibiotics. The gene of the enzyme is transmitted via plasmids, regardless of bacteria type, toward gram-negative bacteria; as a result, indigenous bacteria such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli, Serratia, Enterobacter, and Klebsiella, as well as opportunistic infectious bacteria, become resistant to the antibiotics, and, in an increasing number of cases, have caused mass infections in hospitals.

Up to now, detections for carbapenem-resistant bacteria have be done by a culture method known as the Disk Susceptibility method using a pepar disk impregnated with the drug. However, this method requires three days or more to obtain the results and in some cases the results are ambiguous.

The Takara Bio's bacterial gene detection kit uses Takara Bio's proprietary ICAN method to amplify the target gene and then detect the gene using a hybridization chromatography method combined with gold nanoparticles. Test results are obtained in about 90 minutes as a red band that appears on the test strip. Thus, the kit enables fast, simple tests without any specialized equipment.

Product Name: Bed-Side ICAN^TM blaIMP Detection Kit
Developer/Manufacturer: Takara Bio Inc.
Distributor: Medca Japan Co., Ltd. (Tel: 048-542-3581; URL: http://www.medcajapan.com)
Price (for 16 reactions): 40,000 yen / kit (not including tax)

<Outline of Medca Japan Co., Ltd.>
Name: Medca Japan Co., Ltd.
President: Yutaka Kannari
Address: 3-673 Tenjin, Konosu, Saitama 365-8511 Japan
Founded: October 1, 1974
Capital: 10,168 million yen (as of February 8th, 2002)
Employees: 630 (as of February 8th, 2002)
Businesses: Clinical tests, long-term care operations

This article is translated from news in Japanese for your convenience.