Partillion Bioscience said it has received a two-year, $2.1 million Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) award from the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of General Medical Sciences to expand its Cell-Cell-seq workflows.
The grant was awarded through NIH’s Direct-to-Phase II mechanism, Partillion said in a Sept. 9 statement, and will fund further development of Cell-Cell-seq, a workflow built on Partillion’s Nanovial technology.
The technology preserves defined cell pairs, captures functional outputs such as secretion, activation, and killing, and links those measurements to sequencing data.
Partillion said the funding will let it scale Cell-Cell-seq toward datasets of up to 1 million cell pairs, including broadening compatibility with additional sequencing platforms and developing new analysis tools.
“This award is meaningful because it reflects the scientific merit of Cell-Cell-seq and gives us the resources to move the platform forward,” Partillion CEO and Cofounder Joseph de Rutte said in a statement. “It allows us to pursue ambitious scientific work while keeping our private capital focused on customer adoption and commercial expansion.”
The grant is Partillion’s tenth SBIR award, bringing its total non-dilutive federal funding to more than $8 million, which the company said roughly matches its private investment to date.