Patent Encompasses High-Throughput Sensory Discrimination Technologies
PHILADELPHIA, PA – December 12, 2017 – Opertech Bio, Inc., a company that has pioneered a new, highly efficient and cost effective approach to sensory evaluation, today announced the issuance of U.S. Patent No. 9,841,897, the Company’s second U.S. patent encompassing its proprietary high-throughput sensory discrimination technologies.
“We have recently signed Master Services Agreements with some of the world's largest and best known food and beverage, consumer healthcare, and pharmaceutical companies,” said Scott Horvitz, Opertech’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “Our TāStation™ (Taste+Station) technology is the first automated high throughput system for rapid characterization of taste sensory properties. The TāStation™ system dramatically reduces the reliance on traditional taste panel testing and the associated expenditure of resources in time and costs. TāStation™ enables our customers to make informed decisions, which can lead to accelerated timelines,” he added.
“TāStation™ is an entirely new approach to taste testing and measurement,” said R. Kyle Palmer, Opertech’s Chief Science Officer and inventor of the technology. “TāStation™ is used for evaluating new sweeteners, taste enhancers and bitter blockers and also has broad application in flavor optimization, providing a combinatorial strategy for developing the best tasting ingredient mixtures. In addition to its many applications in the food and beverage industry, TāStation™ technology is particularly well suited for helping consumer healthcare and pharmaceutical companies evaluate the taste of new formulations of medications. This is because TāStation™ is able to generate tremendous amounts of data using minute quantities of drug. The total amount of API (active pharmaceutical ingredient) required for an entire taste test is a small fraction of a typical single daily dose. The capability to test with this minimal level of pharmaceutical exposure cannot be accomplished by any other method or service provider,” he added.
Details of the TāStation System
The TāStation™ includes a portable work station with an automated high throughput system for delivering small samples in rapid succession to a subject. The TāStation™ system has the capacity to determine the taste characteristics of a hundred samples in less than an hour. An individual can be trained through an interactive algorithm, which operates like a game, to make responses on a touch sensitive monitor that are dependent on the subject’s ability to detect and distinguish taste stimuli. Responses are rewarded with an incremental point system that incentivizes sensory acuity. The subjects are focused on the game and may not even be aware that their taste sensitivities and preferences are being recorded.
More data means greater informative power. The comparatively large data sets that are rapidly generated by the TāStation™ system are amenable to sophisticated computational and analytic tools not practical for the limited information from traditional taste assessment. Among the many advantages that result are vastly reduced errors, greater precision in detecting taste effects, improved consistency and predictive value of test outcomes, and the ability to more quickly and broadly test across a diversity of human subjects.
About Opertech Bio, Inc.
Opertech Bio offers its customers a pioneering approach to measuring taste, a multi-billion dollar market covering the food and beverage, flavor ingredients, pet food, and pharmaceutical industries. Opertech Bio’s technology can be used to discover new flavor ingredients, measure palatability and optimize flavor formulations. For more information, please visit the Company's website at www.opertechbio.com.
CONTACT AT:
Opertech Bio:
Scott Horvitz
Chief Executive Officer
(267) 879-0840
shorvitz@opertechbio.com