Helicos BioSciences Corporation was a publicly traded

life science Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energy t ...

company headquartered in

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston ...

focused on

genetic analysis Genetic analysis is the overall process of studying and researching in fields of science that involve genetics and molecular biology. There are a number of applications that are developed from this research, and these are also considered parts of ...

technologies for the research, drug discovery and diagnostic markets. The firm's Helicos Genetic Analysis Platform was the first DNA-sequencing instrument to operate by imaging individual DNA molecules. In May 2010, the company announced a 50% layoff and a re-focusing on molecular diagnostics. After long financial troubles, in November 2010, Helicos was delisted from NASDAQ. Helicos was co-founded in 2003 by life science entrepreneur Stanley Lapidus,

Stephen Quake Stephen Ronald Quake (born 1969) is an American scientist, inventor and entrepreneur. He earned his B.S. in physics and M.S. in mathematics from Stanford in 1991 and his D.Phil. in physics from Oxford University in 1994 as a Marshall Scholar. H ...

, and Noubar Afeyan with investments from

Atlas Venture Atlas Venture is an early-stage venture capital firm that invests in life sciences startup companies in the U.S. Atlas is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where the majority of its investments are located. Atlas rolled out its eleventh ...

, Flagship Ventures,

Highland Capital Partners Highland Capital Partners is a global venture capital firm with offices in Boston, Silicon Valley, and San Francisco. Highland has raised over $4 billion in committed capital and invested in more than 280 companies, with 47 IPOs and 134 Acqui ...

, MPM Capital, and Versant Ventures. Helicos's technology images the extension of individual DNA molecules using a defined primer and individual fluorescently labeled nucleotides, which contain a "Virtual Terminator" preventing incorporation of multiple nucleotides per cycle. The "Virtual Terminator" technology was developed by Dr. Suhaib Siddiqi, while at Helicos Biosciences. In the August 2009 issue of

Nature Biotechnology ''Nature Biotechnology'' is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Nature Portfolio. The chief editor heads an in-house team of editors. The focus of the journal is biotechnology including research results and the commercial busi ...

, Dr. Stephen Quake, a professor of bioengineering at Stanford University and a co-founder of Helicos BioSciences, sequenced his own genome, using Single Molecule Sequencing for under $50,000 in reagents. On November 15, 2012, Helicos BioSciences filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The patents that Helicos had licensed from Cal Tech (where Quake was when he made the underlying inventions) were subsequently licensed to Direct Genomics, founded by Jiankui He, a former post-doc in Quake's lab who gained notoriety in November 2018 when he created the first germline genome-edited babies.

References

External links

Helicos BioSciences Corp.
firm website (Now defunct after Bankruptcy) Biotechnology companies of the United States Genomics companies 2003 establishments in Massachusetts Biotechnology companies established in 2003 Life science companies based in Massachusetts Companies based in Cambridge, Massachusetts Companies that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2012 {{med-company-stub

See also

References

External links