2022 adventures with Solis BioDyne… so far

Can you believe that half of 2022 is already over? It has been quite an adventurous time for us, so here is a short recap of what we have been up to in case you missed something.

January

The year had barely started when we were making connections on the other side of the world at Medlab Middle East in Dubai. It was so great to see our existing partners, meet new clients and talk about new plans. 
 
While already in Dubai, we could not miss out on participating at the Dubai Expo 2020. Together with a distinguished Estonian health-tech delegation, we introduced how high-level research has given rise to globally successful life-science companies. Our CEO, Stephan Goldenbaum was a panelist in the seminar “Digital nation. Personalized solutions for healthcare & wellbeing” and talked about the changes and challenges in molecular diagnostics.

Also in January, Solis BioDyne was invited to be part of the Alliance4life movement, which brings together Ph.D. students and postdoctoral researchers from more than eleven European countries to learn, network, and explore career possibilities. During the Early Stage Researchers' Online Retreat our CEO Stephan introduced our company and shared his experience in the science field.

Furthermore we started a cooperation project with Gearbox Biosciences and participated at the national Digital Cleanup Day in Estonia by cleaning up 149 GB of data in our computers.

In our blog we published a thorough story about RNases and their inhibitors. From the less scientific side you could read an exciting story about our regional sales manager Sébastien

February

Our February was very international starting by welcoming the Ambassador of Japan H.E. Mr. Yukihiko Matsumura and the Second Secretary in charge of economic affairs Mr. Tomoya Shigenari. During the company introduction and a brief tour of our lab, we discussed Estonian innovation in various fields and introduced how we have made the biotech field even more sustainable with StabilityTAG and shipping our products at room temperature around the globe. We concluded that life sciences help people, economies and the environment with optimized solutions and smart customization. 


In addition we made ourselves heard by over 42 million people when UK radio stations invited Stephan to talk about Covid. You can listen to it too from our YouTube channel.

Our biggest achievement was launching SOLIScript® SARS-CoV-2 RT-qPCR Multiplex Assay Kit on the market. It is a multiplex assay optimized for RT-qPCR detection of SARS-CoV-2 viral RNA extracted from clinical samples or extracted from any other sample containing SARS-CoV-2 viral RNA. 

Besides that we found time in February to celebrate the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, Valentines Day and Estonia’s Independence Day. 

In our blog you could read our first Solis in Science interview with researcher PhD Pille Hallast about improving the diagnostics of infertility in men. It turns out that there is a specific region of the Y chromosome, which is prone to microdeletions that substantially increase the risk of severe spermatogenic impairment. The good thing is that a study made by PhD Pille Hallast and her colleagues can help a significant fraction of men originating from Northern and Central European populations with impaired spermatogenesis and identify those at a higher risk of infertility in their early adulthood.

We did some experimenting as well and put our SolisFAST® range to the test. It turns out that we were not only able to take the inhibitor tolerance to another level, but also the stability of our products. You can read all about it from our blog.

March

In March we had our very first open to all webinar about the amazing SolisFAST® range. We talked about multiplexing, different PCR variations, inhibitor tolerance and stability. In case you missed it or would like to hear it again, check out our YouTube channel.

By the end of March we already missed Dubai, so we went back during the Estonian National Day at Dubai Expo 2020, to meet even more (potential) partners and discuss how we can help scientists there to overcome their greatest challenges!

While some of us were traveling around, then others helped students be scientists for a day. Solis BioDyne contributed to Genetic Workshops taking place at the University of Tartu by giving the reagents necessary to do the experiments. Also awards to the students who managed to pay attention the most during the workshop and win the epic quiz at the end. 
 
In our blog we published another interview, this time with You-Sheng Lin from the National Taiwan University and talked about how PCR can be used to detect invasive species. With increasing trade and travel around the world more and more different species have been able to cross their natural geographical barriers and invade a new region. These kinds of biological invasions may pose threats to native fauna and flora, the economy and even human health, which is why doing thorough research on the invasive species is helpful for their effective management and quarantine. The research conducted by You-Sheng Lin and his colleagues aimed to infer the invasion history of longan lanternfly, predict habitat suitability, potential expansion and assess the risk to crop cultivation areas in Taiwan.

We also did an interview with professor Benjamin Schusser from the Technical University of Munich. He and his colleagues have found an innovative and efficient way to generate animals that already express Cas9 and only require the introduction of guide RNAs, which are much smaller and therefore easier to introduce. This allows to study diseases and biomedical issues much more efficiently.

To continue introducing all the super people working in Solis BioDyne we did a story about our developer Reet who has managed to do so many things in one year that it was difficult to fit everything in one blogpost.

April

In April we couldn’t pass up an opportunity to make a great April Fools Day joke, but got back to serious business mode when it came time to visit ECCMID organized by the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. We met with long-term and new partners and gained trust that we are on the right track to being a PCR business partner for stability, customization & scale. 

From the science side we have always known that our reagents and products are IVD-grade. So we decided to go through the certification process ourselves to be even better partners. And here it is our very own IVD certified SOLIScript® SARS-CoV-2 RT-qPCR Multiplex Assay Kit, which was a really huge achievement for us.

In our blog we talked about PCR tests and most common myths related to them. You could also read about our development and technology specialist Ilja and find out how he ended up in Solis BioDyne. In addition we did an interview with mag. med. vet. Verena Zehetner from the University of Veterinary Medicine in Vienna to discuss how humans could improve the health of animals, more specifically the health of horses and donkeys. She has been studying equine parvovirus-hepatitis (EqPV-H). It is a virus that was only discovered in 2018 and is associated with Theiler’s disease, a fulminant and potentially life-threatening hepatic necrosis in equids.  

May

In May we were represented at Tartu University's life sciences career day to find great potential new employees. You could as well meet us at the Global Tomato Congress together with our partner Bio-Connect. We also started with the sporty season and took part in the Tartu Forest Marathon.
Since we were having a stability appreciation month our logistics department put together some fun facts about how great it is to have stable products, which all got uploaded in our blog.

June

In June maybe you saw Solis BioDyne in San Diego and at the Bio International Convention or perhaps at Analytica? Our team was also at FEBS3+ 2022, the Conference of Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian Biochemical Societies, in case you happened to stop by. Our Technology Specialist Dr. Kadri Ligi spoke on the opening day of FEBS3+ how proteins are born. She shed light on our RiboGrip® story, and how we managed to scale up our production to an industrial scale in such a short time. 

Beside all that we dedicated our time to bring you the best products, so that you could improve your monkeypox testing kits. Since, as you know, to prevent this virus from spreading any further it is crucial to implement reliable diagnostic and testing methods.

One half of the year is gone, but the other half certainly seems promising. Be sure to check back soon to read all about our new adventures.