RNS Number:9988K
Tepnel Life Sciences PLC
13 May 2003




FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                              13 May 2003





       Tepnel's BioKits Assay for Detecting Peanuts in Food is First Test
                            to Gain AOAC-RI Approval



               Approved test will lead to improved food labelling



Manchester, UK. 13 May 2003...Tepnel Life Sciences PLC (AIM: TED), the UK-based
international life sciences instrumentation and services company, announces
today that its BioKits Peanut Assay Kit has been granted 'Performance-Tested
Method' status by the AOAC INTERNATIONAL Research Institute (Method No. 030402).



This latest BioKits product is the first food allergen test kit to receive this
internationally recognised status for the estimation of peanut content in
foodstuffs by enzyme immunoassay. The approval enables Tepnel BioSystems to
provide regulatory authorities and primary food manufacturers with a validated,
rapid and accurate test kit for the detection and quantification of allergenic
peanut protein in consumer food products. This will in turn lead to the improved
labelling of such products.



To achieve 'Performance Tested Method' status, the kit, which was developed by
Tepnel BioSystems, underwent rigorous independent third-party evaluation by the
AOAC Research Institute, a subsidiary of AOAC INTERNATIONAL. The evaluation was
designed to confirm that the test kit can be used on many food matrices and
performs as it claims in terms of accuracy, reproducibility, repeatability,
detection limits, false positive/negative rates, robustness, cross-reactivity,
stability and lot-to-lot consistency.



Phil Goodwin, Managing Director of Tepnel BioSystems, said "Peanut allergy is a
serious and potentially fatal condition that can be induced by minute traces of
peanut protein in food. This condition affects millions of people in Europe and
the US, and causes 30,000 hospitalisations and more than 150 deaths in the US
each year. It is therefore essential that food labelling with regard to such
allergens is accurate. The approval granted today by the AOAC for our BioKits
Peanut Assay will provide confidence to manufacturers that they can consistently
detect peanut in the foodstuffs they are producing. It is expected that this
benefit will ultimately filter down to consumers."



Ben Matzilevich, Tepnel's CEO, said "This award is a great achievement for
Tepnel and gives us a significant commercial advantage over potential
competitors. I would like to thank all those at Tepnel BioSystems for their
contribution in developing another world-leading BioKits product and
successfully navigating the complex approval process."



                                     -ends-



For Further Information



Tepnel Life Sciences plc
Ben Matzilevich, CEO
Gron Ffoulkes-Davies, Finance Director
0161 946 2200



Tepnel BioSystems Limited
Phil Goodwin, Managing Director
01244 280 202



HCC De Facto Group
David Dible / Mark Swallow
020 7496 3300





Notes to Editors



Tepnel Life Sciences is a UK-based international life sciences instrumentation
and services company with a 'tri-polar' strategy focused on providing the
biomedical industry with high-throughput automated DNA purification systems,
manual DNA purification kits and reagents, as well as scientific services for
nucleic acid purification, drug analysis, genotyping and genetically modified
foods.



The Company was founded in 1992 to exploit DNA technology generated at UMIST
(University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology) and is quoted on
the AIM segment of the London Stock Exchange (AIM: TED).



www.tepnel.com






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