Seeking European partners with expertise in nanotechnology and microfluidics

Keystone Labs Inc. is a Health Canada accredited laboratory focused on quality Microbiological and Analytical testing. Keystone’s primary focus has been on Pharmaceutical, Biotechnology, Medical Device and Nutraceutical companies.).

With an eye towards the legalization of medical cannabis in Canada, Keystone Labs received a Drug and Controlled Substance License through Health Canada in August 2015 to conduct cannabis testing in a regulated environment. The company’s validated testing is poised to open the door to new testing opportunities.

On the R&D side, Keystone’s KEY-CHIP real-time testing platform technology will offer worldwide cannabis users, personal, and commercial growers significant data analysis within minutes. The KEY-CHIP technology will use state-of-the-art solid-state microchip technology and be capable of creating accurate quantitative results in real-time, which is not found on the market at this time. When used by personal and commercial cannabis growers, they can determine where each plant is in its growth cycle for maximum cannabinoid production to offer the best product and determine optimal harvest time.

This microchips will be incorporated into a cassette and onboard microfluidics technology will allow interaction of the client’s sample with the microchip technology. The cassette will be inserted into an amplification device which will detect and quantitate the cannabinoids. The information will be sent to a smartphone interactive App via Bluetooth for analysis and data display results. The first KEY-CHIP device will be a real-time test kit for cannabinoid detection of THD and CBD. The project is currently in prototype.

The personal product and real-time platform technologies will allow for the development of other key testing requirements by Health Canada. This access to cannabis testing will allow producers and providers the confidence and security the product has not been adulterated and meets their specific requirements.

Using our existing product platform, Keystone Labs will pursue development of the following test kits for microbial contamination, pesticides, heavy metals, aflatoxins, terpenes and residual solvents.

In this way, Keystone Labs is looking for European partners to develop real-time accuracy for the cannabis industry. As more European countries move towards legalization of medical cannabis and possible recreational cannabis, the potential to develop a product with technical excellence from around the world.

The project would be to develop partnerships for different parts of the device. These would include nanotechnology and microfluidics, image capture and image analysis, app development, antibody development and device engineering.

Preferences / Requirements for Potential European Partner(s)

Keystone would like to partner with European companies which have expertise in nanotechnology and microfluidics to develop a state-of-the-art technology with pinpoint accuracy in real-time. It would be beneficial for the nanotechnology and microfluidic partner to have the following expertise:

• Infrastructure for development as well as production of single chips with different components
• Microfluidic expertise with onboard chip reagents, precise control, and manipulation of fluids on the chip
• Development of operating devices interacting with the chips
• Possible micro-optical technology (cameras)

Other areas of excellence for potential partnerships would be antibody development for commercialization, image capture and analysis and device engineering development. Other following expertise beneficial to a partnership for development of this device would be:

• Development of specific antibody-producing cell lines for commercial production for new targets for the device
• Program coding and APP development of software for image analysis