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COVER STORY
and package handling, stability and reagent
management, and other R&D applications.”
Such features are offered as part of
a single IT platform that can be configured
to afford flexibility at individual laboratories
but also promote standard practices at
global research organizations.
THE COMPANY’S most recent LIMS adaptation
is software for accessing, reporting,
and analyzing disparate data. For this,
Labvantage has formed a partnership with
InforSense, a supplier of data integration
and predictive analysis software. Under the
agreement, Labvantage will market Infor-
Sense’s software along with its Sapphire
LIMS.
Simon Beaulah, senior marketing manager
for InforSense, sees advantages to both
laboratory managers and bench scientists in
combining LIMS and data analysis software.
“We provide visualization tools through the
Web,” he says. “You can think of it as scientific
business intelligence. It is a matter of
getting the right data to the scientist so that
the scientist can make the right decision.”
Translational research is a major impetus for
adding an analysis dimension to standard
benchtop computing, according to Beaulah.
James DeGreef, vice president of market
strategy with LIMS provider GenoLogics,
says his firm is working on integrating its
LIMS with InforSense software. “LIMS and
analytics working together is a trend now,”
DeGreef says. “It’s a natural fit.” Researchers
are interested in integrating these functions
to advance proteomics and genomics
research, which are key practices among
GenoLogics’ target customers.
Like Labvantage, GenoLogics adds features
to its LIMS software on a regular basis.
But partnership with other software suppliers
has long been a route to linking with
completely different kinds of software and
automation. “A lot of our work is done with
instrumentation providers,” DeGreef says,
citing a partnership with Illumina, a gene sequencing
and genotyping systems supplier.
According to DeGreef, the LIMS market
is trending away from generic software
to products targeted at specific areas of
research. GenoLogics, which has always
targeted the life sciences, offers a basic
system called Omix, as well as a specialized
product for genomics called Geneus and
one for proteomics called Proteus.
Given the need for software customization
and the availability of Web-based tools
to connect software, Biomatrica, a LIMS
supplier launched five years ago, sells its
software as a series of modular applications.
“We are seeing a trend away from big, monolithic
LIMS systems that try to capture all the
data at one time,” Brian Baumann, director
of software products, says. Although largescale
systems might work well in biobanking
applications, Baumann says, drug and biotech
research can be handled more efficiently
by linking modular software components
at the bench to a central database.
Baumann adds that new product development
at Biomatrica also focuses on
ease of use—developing software that can
be maintained by the researcher. “In a lot
of big pharma and
biotechnology companies,
IT departments
don’t support scientific
software,” he
says. “They deal more
with IT infrastructure.
LIMS needs to
be made more intuitive
to the user.” And
LIMS must be easily
integrated with other
laboratory software
and automation, extending
the modular
approach into a multivendor
IT landscape.
Some software
developers have
launched new products
operating at the
middle level of the lab
IT pyramid that are
specifically designed
to link research software
and databases.
BioFortis, for example,
has introduced
software called Lab-
Matrix that vets data
collected by LIMS at
the laboratory level
and routes it where it is needed.
SNAPSHOT
Laboratory
information
management
systems are
taking on the
reams of data
produced by life
sciences research
automation.
“LIMS are involved in gene expression,
imaging, and converting information into
numbers, but not every number needs to be
carried up the pyramid,” Jian Wang, chief
WWW.CEN-ONLINE.ORG 16 NOVEMBER 24, 2008