Profile

BioComp Instruments has focused on the development, manufacture and sale of scientific instruments used in biomedical research. The Company was started in 1985 by Dr. David Coombs, a professor of molecular biology at the University of New Brunswick , when he discovered a rapid new way to generate density gradients for use in the ultracentrifuge. When he had patented this invention, Dr. Coombs held patents at both ends of the use of gradients; a gradient former and a gradient fractionator, the latter of which he had developed as a graduate student at UCLA.

Since its first sale in 1986, the Gradient Master has grown to become the world's gold standard gradient former with an installed base of over 1200 units.

Commercial development of the Piston Gradient Fractionator was completed in 1995. It and Gradient Master now work together to deliver the most accurate and sensitive gradient analysis available. Combining these two instruments into one made perfect sense so we have developed a hybrid instrument called the Gradient Station that offers the best of both worlds. Dr. Norman Watts, then a Ph.D. student in Dr. Coombs' lab, adapted the Gradient Master to perform roller blot development, and so the patented blotting line was launched. The Navigator and its magnetic-bottomed blotting bottles offer a unique blotting philosophy: "Let the bottle fit the blot". The bottles are held to a rotating steel plate magnetically, so any size bottle can be run without the need for clips or brackets. A large variety of magnetic bottles are now offered with the concept of avoiding overlap during development to prevent "shadowing" in areas of reagent starvation.

As we enter our 24th year, we have found our place in the biotech community as a small, friendly, accessible company with a truly novel product line that will revolutionize the way you do science.