New Urine-based Test to Learn Baby's Gender on Track at TrovaGene, Inc.

Online, August 10, 2011 (Newswire.com) - San Diego, CA - The American Medical Association's study of highly-reliable testing to determine a baby's sex early in pregnancy has accelerated efforts of scientists at TrovaGene, Inc., to develop a fetal DNA test that analyzes urine -- rather than blood -and is non-invasive and simple to administer.

The TrovaGene (Pink Sheets: TROV) program is focusing on detection of a number of fetal conditions, including Down Syndrome.

The TrovaGene technology is 95% accurate at predicting boys at seven weeks, and 88% at predicting girls, Gabriele Cerrone, the company's co-founder and developer, told The New York Times.

The TrovaGene test, because of its non-invasive procedure, would eliminate the need for an amniocentesis , which calls for use of a long needle and has been known to cause some miscarriages, Cerrone said. In addition, it would provide for a simpler process of collecting, shipping and analyzing urine, as opposed to blood.

The AMA study found that the gender of a baby after seven months of pregnancy, and is very accurate provided it is administered properly.

Medical professionals were quoted in the Times as saying the study had wide-reaching implications, and that it could lead to greater use of the test.

TrovaGene, successor to Xenomics, Inc., is moving on several fronts in pursing development of its test.

The company disclosed that it has regained ownership of several patents for transrenal technology for prenatal diagnostic and screening applications that had been licensed to Sequenom, Inc., in 2008.

TrovaGene sued Sequenom for the return of the technology rights in 2009 when it charged in a lawsuit that Sequenom committed fraud. The company said it recovered the worldwide rights and control of the patents by through termination of the license agreement.

"Recently, we have generated data by next-generation sequencing that unambiguously demonstrated the plurality and genomic representation of fetal transrenal sequences in urine from pregnant women," said Dr. Thomas Adams, TrovaGene's chairman.

"TrovaGene has initiated partnering discussions with several companies, whose analytical technologies are synergistic to short transrenal DNA fragments in urine, complementing its propriety nucleic acid extractions and processing methodologies."

David Robbins, TrovaGene's vice president, research and development, added:

"Encouraged by our sequencing data we believe the right combination of analytical technologies merged with the enriched source of transrenal DNA fragments in urine allows us to be extraordinarily competitive within this prenatal screening market in terms of cost and time to result while maintaining high clinical sensitivity and specificity."

For further information, please contact:
Alex Michelini
Representative, TrovaGene, Inc.
201-831-0171, 201-895-1126
[email protected]