MIT AND N. Michigan University to investigate MIT 1000 Enhancement to give more rapid Pathogen Test Results
San Clemente, CA. July 29, 2014....Micro Imaging Technology, Inc. (OTCQB: MMTC) announced that it has funded the collaboration with Northern Michigan University (NMU) to investigate an alternative pathogen sample preparation method that could provide a specimen test turnaround time of 4 to 5 hours.
Dr. Amit Morey, an expert food microbiologist and a consultant to Micro Imaging Technology (MIT), proposed the new sample preparation method. He said, “This method will revolutionize the MIT 1000 System and significantly broaden its appeal in the clinical health, and food safety markets, as well as other pathogen testing arenas.”
Dr. David Haavig, Chief Scientist of MIT, said, “Even though the MIT 1000 System is the fastest and least expensive bacterial pathogen test today, it still requires bacteria taken from culture plates. This new method will significantly simplify the bacterial isolation step and completely eliminate the culture plate growth time of 16-24 hours. If successful, this new method will reduce the entire specimen identification turnaround time to 4 to 5 hours.”
Dr. Josh S. Sharp, Ph.D., assistant professor at the Northern Michigan University Department of Biology in Marquette, Michigan, has been spearheading the collaboration between MIT and NMU since October of 2013. He is researching clinical applications of the MIT 1000 System, particularly the pathogens Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) and Methicillin Resistant S. aureus (MRSA). “It has been shown that rapid identification of bacterial pathogens has the potential to improve successful patient outcomes,” said Dr. Sharp. “However many of the current agar plate based identification methods require 16-24 hours of growth before identifications can be made,” he continued. “To decrease the time for organism identification, the Sharp lab at NMU will be working in collaboration with MIT to develop a method to capture S. aureus bacteria directly from a specimen. Using the MIT 1000, this would decrease the total time for S. aureus identification to 4 to 5 hours. Our goal is to reduce the time from specimen to pathogen identification resulting in the ability to quickly implement proper antimicrobial therapy to patients.”
“Preliminary results by the Sharp lab are very encouraging and very exciting,” said Jeff Nunez, President of MIT. “If Dr. Sharp’s efforts are successful, and we are highly confident they will be, this will be a major game changer since this new method can easily be extended to other significant clinical and food safety pathogens. Additionally, this method can be fully accomplished well within an eight hour lab technicians work shift. When this is combined with today’s lowest bacteria pathogen per test cost, the MIT 1000 System should be the obvious choice for clinical and food safety diagnostic laboratories.”
MIT 1000 has been certified by the AOAC for identification of Listeria spp. The Company recently announced that it had also added Staphylococcus (Staph) and Salmonella enterica serotype Choleraesuis (S. Choleraesuis) to its catalog of identifiers. It is continuing development of, a series of Salmonella Identifiers including Salmonella spp, S. Heidelberg, S. Enteritidis and S. Typhimurium.
ABOUT: NORTHERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY
Northern Michigan University, located in Marquette, Michigan, is a dynamic four-year, public, coeducational university that has grown its reputation based on its award-winning leadership programs, cutting-edge technology initiatives and nationally recognized academic programs. The university's fastest growing academic areas are clinical science, biology, and the geographical and environmental sciences. Northern Michigan has a population of about 9,000 undergraduate and graduate students. It offers 180 degree programs, including 18 graduate programs.
ABOUT: MICRO IMAGING TECHNOLOGY, INC.
Micro Imaging Technology, Inc. is a California-based public company that is also registered to do business under the name Micro Identification Technologies. MIT has developed and patented the MIT 1000, a stand-alone, rapid, optically-based, software driven system that can identify pathogenic bacteria and complete an identification test, after culturing, in three minutes (average) at the lowest cost per test when compared to any other conventional method. It does not rely on chemical or biological agents, conventional processing, fluorescent tags, gas chromatography or DNA analysis. The process requires only clean filtered water and a sample of the unknown bacteria. Revenues for all rapid testing methods exceed $5 billion annually – with food safety accounting for more than $3.5 billion, which is expected to surpass $4.7 billion by 2015 according to BCC Research. In addition, the recently passed “New” U.S. Food Safety Bill is expected to further accelerate the current annual growth rate of 6.6 percent.
In June 2009, the AOAC Research Institute (AOAC RI) awarded the Company Performance Tested Methods SM (PTM) certification for the rapid identification of Listeria. The AOAC RI provides an independent third party evaluation and expert reviews of methods and will award PTM certification to methods that demonstrate performance levels equivalent or better than other certified bacteria identifying methods. The MIT System underwent hundreds of individual tests, including ruggedness and accuracy, to earn AOAC RI’s certification for the identification of Listeria.
You can find more information about our company and about Micro Identification TechnologiesTM. Please visit our newly enhanced website at www.micro-identification.com.