Helicos BioSciences, Children's Oncology Group To Collaborate

Jun 24, 2008 (financialwire.net via COMTEX) -- WPI | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- June 24, 2008 (FinancialWire) Helicos BioSciences (NASDAQ: HLCS | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) (Current Market Cap. US$96.93 Mil.) has entered into a scientific collaboration with the Children's Oncology Group in order to interrogate a wide spectrum of genomic variation within various sarcomas, an aggressive type of bone or soft tissue cancer usually found in children and young adults.

Other companies trading in Helicos BioSciences' industry include Barr Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NYSE: BRL), Mylan Inc. (NYSE: MYL), and Watson Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NYSE: WPI).

The collaboration is multifaceted and involves a model system chosen by COG, which includes human biological samples collected from a single patient. These samples include a normal bone marrow sample and tumor cell lines derived from a Ewing's sarcoma primary tumor biopsy and the metastasis from the same patient obtained after two cycles of chemotherapy. It is hoped that an in-depth comparison of genomic DNA sequence and RNA expression between the normal tissue, primary tumor, and treatment resistant metastasis will reveal structural and functional genomic changes associated with clinical aggressiveness and treatment resistance.

The collaboration includes a prestigious group of COG scientists, led by Greg Reaman, professor of pediatrics at The George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences and chairman of COG, and Timothy Triche, chair of pathology at the Children's Hospital, Los Angeles and vice chair of translational research at COG.

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