Thermo Fisher Scientific ‘to award researchers grants’

Thermo Fisher Scientific has revealed that it will award more than $400,000 (£244,723 pounds) worth of reagents to life science researchers through a newly-devised grant programme.

The RNA-interference (RNAi) reagents it will allocate will be used to study genes in medical research and drug discovery, the firm stated.

Its grant programme will include a variety of siRNA, shRNA and microRNA reagents from the industry-leading Dharmacon and Open Biosystems RNAi technology – products which are marketed through its own name.

Marc Casper, chief operating officer of Thermo Fisher Scientific, commented: "We have created this grant programme to advance RNAi-based screening and to help our life sciences customers accelerate their discoveries."

A total of five projects will be selected as recipients of the resources.

In other Thermo Fisher Scientific news, the organisation’s latest Fourier-transform infrared microscope was named as a winner of R&D Magazine Awards’ technologically-significant scientific products of 2009 earlier this month.