Cantata Micro-C Library Preparation

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Cancer Institute (NCI), Laboratory of Receptor Biology and Gene Expression (LRBGE), within the Center for Cancer Research (CCR), plans to procure, on a sole source basis, Preparation and sequencing of Micro-C libraries from: Cantata Bio 100 Enterprise Way, Suite A101 Scotts Valley, CA 95066 The response close date of the notice for this requirement is in accordance with FAR 5.203(b).

This acquisition will be processed under FAR Part 12 – Acquisition for Commercial Items and will be made pursuant to the authority in FAR Part 13.106-1 (b)(1) and is exempt from the requirements of FAR Part 6. The North American Industry Classification System code is 541380 Testing Laboratories and the business size standard is $16.5 million.

As a new technology, most labs that use Micro-C build it from the ground up, requiring specialized equipment and extensive optimization that can take many months or even years to troubleshoot. Cantata Bio is the only company known to NCI which has developed kits and services for Micro-C thus far and has put extensive time and money into these optimization processes for multiple cell types and inputs.

Using Cantata’s Micro-C service is currently the most cost-effective method of generating Micro-C libraries, and it is the only Micro-C service currently offered in the field. Micro-C is a cutting-edge chromatin conformation capture technique that offers much higher base-pair resolution than similar methods such as Hi-C at the same sequencing depth making it cost effective as well as offering deeper scientific insights.

Micro-C will identify more enhancer-promoter contacts in CCR’s samples, allowing to more sensitively identify changes during cancer progression. This technology is unique to the needs of the NCI because it provides the highest resolution maps of the 3D organization of genomes in cancer cells. The technology is central to NCI’s needs and mission as it allows for the first time to map changes in 3D genome organization in cancer cells and to relate them to aberrant gene expression in cancer. Therefore, Cantata is the only known source that meet NCI’s needs at this time.