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Department of Biological Sciences

Biological Sciences

Research Capabilities

Core Strength

Our Department is capable of undertaking contract research projects sponsored by a company, commercial organization or institution with a predefined work scope and schedule. We will act as an extension of the sponsoring company's scientific and engineering expertise, allowing it to leverage resources. We also can work closely with companies to define project goals and tailor the project to meet specific needs. Results will be strictly proprietary to the sponsor, and customer satisfaction quality checks will be conducted immediately following completion of all contract research projects.

  • Contract Research
  • Consultancy and troubleshooting
  • Specialised training to industrial personnel
  • Biotech policy research, IPR issues and bioethics

 

More on our capabilities

Our Department is capable of undertaking contract research projects sponsored by a company, commercial organization or institution with a predefined work scope and schedule. We will act as an extension of the sponsoring company's scientific and engineering expertise, allowing it to leverage resources. We also can work closely with companies to define project goals and tailor the project to meet specific needs. Results will be strictly proprietary to the sponsor, and customer satisfaction quality checks will be conducted immediately following completion of all contract research projects. The thrust areas of our research activities include:

  • Bioinformatic Services Homology modeling, Database search and creation, In-silico simulation of protein folding and elucidation of structure-function relationship along with in-vivo and in-vitro (wet lab) studies
  • Molecular Biology Services Genotyping, Vector development and Cloning, Gene Expression Assay, cDNA Services, Library Construction, Library Screening, Gene Mutagenesis, Bacterial identification and strain improvement
  • Microbiology Services Microbial Strain Characterization, Broad range of test methods from standard food and water safety to specialized quality control tests for the pharmaceutical industry, tests for detecting and quantifying heavy metals, radionuclides, antibiotics and pesticides; screening and bioassays
  • Fermentation & Downstream Processing Services Small scale production, analysis (QC), purification and formulation of commercially important biotech products following cGMP and GLP regulations

Contract Research

Mission

To provide services to contribute to the realization of client's biotech business goals.

Services

To provide hands-on support in biotech research projects, sustained by a strong scientific back up through consultancy and process troubleshooting.

Our group is very much capable of undertaking contract research projects sponsored by any company, commercial organization or institution with a predefined work scope and schedule. We will act as an extension of the sponsoring company's scientific and engineering expertise, allowing it to leverage resources. We also can work closely with companies to define project goals and tailor the project to meet specific needs. Results will be strictly proprietary to the sponsor, and customer satisfaction quality checks will be conducted immediately following completion of all contract research projects. The thrust areas of our research activities include:

  • Bioremediation, Biomining & Biorefining - for combating environmental pollution by removing heavy metals and radioisotopes from nuclear wastes and other industrial effluents, detecting heavy metal and quantifying their concentrations using novel biosensor technology, for recovering useful metals from ores and for refining fossil fuels from sulfur and nitrogen.
  • Biodiagnostics and Biotherapeutics - for developing effective diagnostic kits for intractable diseases and cloning in indigenously made vectors and expression of novel genes for recombinant therapeutic proteins including novel combination of cytokines with synergistic actions by using molecular biology and genetic engineering techniques and also for better understanding and therapy against Malaria using Molecular Immunology and Parasitology techniques.
  • Cell and Tissue Culture Technology - for expressing commercially important transgenic proteins of animal and plant origin for their use as nutritional supplements, edible vaccines, biopesticides etc. and for producing medicines from herbal extracts.
  • Bioprocess Development, Modeling and Optimization - for the enhanced production and purification of biotech products of commercial interest by developing suitable mathematical models and by response surface optimization coupled with genetic algorithms to facilitate process scale-up.

Consultancy and troubleshooting

BITS-Biotech team of scientists is capable of providing consultancy to assist in problems associated with routine quality control monitoring, design and implementation of SOP's and test protocols in molecular biology and immunology, environmental biotechnology, cell and tissue culture, bioprocess development, optimization and scale-up, technology evaluation and assessment to facilitate critical development and business decisions and also process troubleshooting in custom bio-manufacturing of fermentation based biotech products using scientific acumen, skill and bioinformatic tools. We are also able to provide consultancy in clinical research, toxicological, bioequivalence and bioavailability studies using the state-of-the-art animal house facility that is coming up.

We can also serve as an adjunct laboratory to expand and assist in-house capabilities of our clients. On-site consultations will be made available to resolve specific problems. We can also design projects for our clients suiting their specific needs and market demand.

Specialised training to industrial personnel

Our team of scientists is capable of conducting hands-on training programs and workshops in modern biotechnology techniques involving RT-PCR, Cloning, Gel-Documentation, Microarrays, 2-D PAGE, ELISA, Atomic absorption spectral analysis, Radio-isotope labeling, bioreactor design and operation for free and immobilized microbial, animal and plant cells and enzymes, biochemical analyses using HPLC, GC, FTIR, Fluorescence and UV-Visible spectroscopy etc. The trainees from biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries and entrepreneurs will also be subjected to Bioinformatics, one of our core areas, for genomics and proteomics for establishing structure-function relationships of proteins and protein folding.

Biotech policy research, IPR issues and bioethics

Apart from research and development activities, we also can offer and provide consultancy and support in understanding and resolving complex research issues, which involve drafting biotech policy for public and private enterprises, addressing issues related to intellectual property rights and focusing on bioethical issues for proper genetic resource management and conservation, maintenance of biodiversity and market-driven biotechnology and bioeconomics. We believe that any biotech policy should aim at deriving and harvesting maximum benefits from biotech research for the mankind by enforcing certain stringent biosafety and bioethical norms and regulations pertaining to GM crops/foods and human cloning and to design a new structure for regulating and supervising research on and the commercial use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs). We think that therapeutic cloning involving microbes and embryonic stem cells for treating intractable human diseases should be given green signal while completely banning or forbidding human reproductive cloning. We encourage and advocate for intellectual property protection through patents and copyrights following TRIPS as passed and accepted by WTO countries including India. So we are capable enough to guide and provide support and service to frame biotech policy, to protect intellectual property of our prospective clients and to address bioethical issues in right perspective.