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Ahura Scientific Secures More Than $3.75 Million in Government Contracts

Posted on: Friday, 25 May 2007, 18:00 CDT

Ahura Scientific, Inc. today announced it has secured government contracts exceeding $3.75 million for advanced instrument development to occur during the next five years. The contracts build upon the company's chemical identification technology and will further improve the ruggedness, manufacturability and miniaturization of the company's award-winning product line. The funding will also enable the company to expand into the medical diagnostics market.

"Ahura's FirstDefender set the benchmark for portable rugged chemical instrumentation. Users around the globe continue to look to Ahura to take field-portable instrumentation to the next level -- more accurate, rugged and compact and with even greater functionality," said Douglas Kahn, chairman and chief executive officer of Ahura Scientific, Inc. "We look forward to working with these partners to enhance our innovative technology and products to better meet the needs of our customers."

Contract Highlights

-- DTRA Awards $2 million contract for advanced chemical identification system

Ahura Scientific has been awarded a multi-year contract from the U.S. Army Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) for development of an advanced chemical identification system with increased situational awareness and usability. This contract is valued at $1.98 million.

The rapid identification of potentially hazardous materials such as explosives, chemical weapons, narcotics, or toxic industrial chemicals is becoming increasingly critical for war fighters. Most identification techniques are only man-portable and many require sampling or handling of the material of interest. Many of these tools are far from the ruggedness and robustness needed in the field.

This development effort will benefit the warfighter by providing a more clear awareness of clandestine activities during site exploration through near instant chemical identification, monitoring of the surroundings, and the integration of physiochemical inputs for the rendering of a comprehensive probability-based risk assessment.

Note: Ahura Scientific, Inc. acknowledges that the effort described in this section is sponsored by the U.S. Army Research Office. The content does not necessarily reflect the position or the policy of the Government and no official endorsement should be inferred.

-- Ahura Scientific to receive $1.6 million from NIH as subcontractor to Tufts University on development of microsensor arrays for saliva diagnostics

Under the leadership of Dr. David Walt of Tufts University, Ahura and six other organizations will participate in a five-year development of technologies for the early detection of disease via saliva diagnosis. The contract to Tufts was from National Institutes of Health/National Institute for Dental and Craniofacial Research. This contract is valued at $1.6 million.

Ahura Scientific will lead the design, development and test of a battery-powered portable optical reader for bead arrays. This intelligent optical reader will leverage Ahura's vertically integrated facility and the expertise of Ahura's development and manufacturing teams to ensure creation of an affordable and realizable solution which is manufacturable on a mass scale. This is plausible by approaching the problem from the component design level and not merely from the traditional integrator perspective. The group expects to have sufficient results to prepare FDA filings within five years.

More information at http://ase.tufts.edu/chemistry/walt/saliva/

-- Ahura Scientific developing robotic chemical ID system for U.S. Army RDECOM Edgewood Chemical Biological Center

Ahura Scientific is developing for the U.S. Army RDECOM Edgewood Chemical Biological Center a compact chemical identification system with a remote fiberoptic probe designed for attachment to a robot arm on an iRobot PacBot robot. Based on Raman spectroscopy, the system will identify the contents of bottles, bags and raw chemicals remotely. The system is designed to be entirely self-contained and perform chemical analysis fully on-board. Algorithm results and spectra are relayed via an 802.11 wireless link to a laptop/tablet PC for remote analysis and decision making.

This contract is valued at $180,000.

Ahura's technical leadership is recognized by academic institutions and federal agencies for innovation and rapid product development. With a multidisciplinary engineering team and a vertically integrated production facility, Ahura Scientific can quickly design, develop and mass produce products that meet the needs of the marketplace. Current customers include the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Army, U.S. Customs and Immigration, Fire Department of New York, City of Seattle Fire Department, Washington D.C. Fire Department, New Jersey State Police, Pennsylvania State Police and more than 150 other agencies in North America, Europe and Asia.

About Ahura Scientific, Inc.

Ahura Scientific, Inc. develops rugged, ultra-compact, field-enabled optical systems for the immediate identification and authentication of liquid and solid chemical substances. Customers include the homeland security, life sciences, industrial and medical markets. Manufactured in the USA in an ISO 9001-certified facility, the company's products offer exceptional portability and unparalleled performance.

More information at www.ahurascientific.com.

 Media Contact: Kerstin Barr Ahura Scientific, Inc. 978-642-2547 kbarr@ahurascientific.com

SOURCE: Ahura

Source: MARKET WIRE

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