Jena Firm Delivers Detection Technology To Measure Pollutants in Petroleum Products for USA

Dr. Klaus Berka, CEO of Analytik Jena AG

Analytik Jena AG, developer and supplier of sensitive measuring devices used by researchers in natural sciences, biochemistry and molecular biology, has announced that it is also going into the oil business.

Well, sort of.

In September 2001, Analytik Jena acquired the American company, APS Technologies, Inc. of Houston, Texas, to manufacture machines that can measure extremely low levels of pollutants, including sulfur and chloride, in petroleum products. New government restrictions in the United States will soon require substantial reductions of sulfur in fuels and oil companies are scambling to find a way to monitor sulfur content in its products.

The APS/Analytik technology was cited in January 2001 by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as the “method of choice” for determining the presence of these substances in fuels and will be submitted for a world patent. The acquisition of APS Technologies, Inc. and its USEPA recognized technology for the measurement of sulfur in fuels and the determination of the magnitude of pollutants, “will be one of the most important expansions for Analytik Jena AG in the history or the company,” said Dr. Klaus Berka, CEO.

“This will be a tremendous asset for our entrée into the American market and will also consolidate our continuously expanding position in the international marketplace.”

Dr. Berka estimates that there is a potential market in the US alone for between 400 and 600 fuel analyzers. Analytik Jena develops and produces a wide variety of modern analysis measurement systems for industrial and scientific applications, particularly in the high growth markets of environmental protection, life sciences and biotechnology. A core business of the company is in the analysis of molecular interactions in biotechnology research.

If you are a molecular biologist, working in biological, medical or pharmaceutical research, investigating the interaction between biological molecules you may be looking for a fast method to determine the binding constants in very small samples volumes. Analytik Jena makes a device called the ConfoCor 2 that uses fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy helps solve biochemical problems such as:

• Antigen-antibody interactions

• Protein-nucleic acid interactions

• Nucleic acid hybridization

• Enzyme kinetics

Another major activity of Analytic Jena is making atomic spectroscopic instruments that enable the analysis of almost any substance: whether solid or liquid, food or soil samples, blood plasma or serum, cooling water or oil. The company is a technological leader in the area of solid sampling analysis.

Basically, a sample is placed in a sort of oven and heated for a few seconds. The analysis that follows allows for the measurement of chemical concentrations in extremely low levels. This analysis is especially useful in the detection of tiny amounts of lead in water, for example, and other harmful substances.

Analytik’s highly sophisticated measurement technologies help medical researchers around the globe in the search for new medicines. Automated screening techniques can analyze huge numbers of samples at the same time saving time and lowering costs.

The company is also developing a diagnostic instrument based on infrared technology that allows a doctor to evaluate spinal cord , brain and other organ injuries without any surgery. Patients can go home the same day since there is no sampling required.

Analytik Jena was founded in 1990 by three applied scientists from the “combine collective” of Carl Zeiss Jena as one of the first private enterprises based in the new eastern states of Germany. Originally, the company operated as a marketer of analysis systems developed by other companies, now their competitors, but it soon became a systems developer and supplier itself.

Analytik Jena, which now has about 300 employees, went public in July 2001 and is listed on the Neuer Markt, Germany’s version of the NASDAQ stock exchange in Frankfurt. For further company information, see www.analytik-jena.de.—