Tecan is pleased to announce the results of the Tecan Award 2011. Established in 2010 to celebrate the innovation and ingenuity of Tecan's loyal customers, the 2011 award has been won by Svenja Kristina Holle from the University Hospital of Muenster (UHM), Germany. Using an Infinite^® 200 microplate reader, Svenja and the UHM team have developed an ex vivo method for investigating the dynamics of organic cation transport in proximal tubules of the kidney. This innovative optical method could be adapted to almost any kind of freshly isolated biological material and transport system using a suitable fluorescent substrate.

The annual Tecan Award certainly highlights some impressive and imaginative uses for the Company's detection instruments, and second place in the 2011 competition went to Michael Bunge from the Institute of Applied Microbiology at Giessen University, Germany, who is using an Infinite M200 to monitor the effects of a metallic nanoparticle-based approach to eliminating the growth of potential pathogenic microorganisms in drinking water. Third place went to María Isabel Pividori from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), Spain, for developing a novel method for the quantification of gliadin in gluten-free foods using a Sunrise^TM reader. 

The 2011 award will be presented to Svenja during a tour of Tecan's Detection Headquarters in Grödig, Austria, as part of her prize of a trip to the romantic city of Salzburg. To find out more about the Tecan Award and details of the winning entries, visit www.tecan.com/award.