© РИА Томск. Павел Стефанский TOMSK, Sep 30 – RIA Tomsk. Tomsk State University of Control Systems and Radioelectronics (TUSUR) will receive a grant of 320 million rubles to create an instrumentation base for research and development using genetic technologies, the university's press service said on Thursday.
The Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation has summed up the results of the competition for grants for the implementation of measures of the federal scientific and technical program for the development of genetic technologies for 2019-2027. A total of 128 applications from 35 regions of the country were submitted for the competition.
"Tomsk State University of Control Systems and Radioelectronics will receive 320 million rubles to create a genetic printer... The grant funds will be used to implement a project dedicated to the development of the existing and creation of a new Russian instrumentation base for research and development using genetic technologies," says the report.
It is added that two other Tomsk universities will take part in the project: classical (TSU) and medical (SSMU) universities, as well as Kurchatov Institute (Moscow), Institute of Chemical Biology and Fundamental Medicine SB RAS (Novosibirsk) and an industrial partner of TUSUR - Miсran research and production company. TUSUR will be the lead performer in the project.
© РИА Томск. Павел Стефанский
Two laboratories will be set up to conduct research on the basis of the executing organizations: Additive Technologies and Engineering Biology and Genomic Engineering.
Currently, there are a limited number of gene producers in the world, as well as oligonucleotide arrays (a short fragment of DNA or RNA) from which gene constructs can subsequently be created. The vast majority of manufacturers are localized in the US, the report said.
"The implementation of the project will reduce Russia's technological lag in the field of instrumentation base for genetic technologies, as well as provide sovereignty over key functional units and materials. In addition, the work will create scientific and technological groundwork for medicine, agriculture, and industry," TUSUR Vice-Rector for Research and Innovation Anton Loshchilov is quoted.