Biophotonics market to emerge in 2011
Experts predict a $2 billion industry in a few years; intrinisc and extrinsic sensors try to prove themselves in the drug industry but with limited success; breakthroughs needed in microarrays before major homeland security applications will be possible
Turn on the light. The market for biophotonic sensors — those that use light and fiber optics — is wide open to technologically savvy companies smart enough to jump in now, according to a recent speech titled “Trends and Opportunities in Biophonotics” by Dr. David Krohn of Lightwave Venture Consulting. According to Krohn, although the overall sensor market is $16 billion, which includes everything from military to agricultural applications, biophonotics could make up as much as $2 billion of that by 2011. Assuming, that is, that those in the biophonotics business suceed in distinguishing themselves from their rivals in the sensing and detection marketplace.
There are two different types of biophotonic sensors. The first, intrinsic sensors, detect substances via the modulation of light by the imbedded bimolecular properties of a sensing element. The second, extrinsic sensors (also known as hybrid fiber-optic sensors) monitor biological processes by conventional photonic sensing methods. So far, both have struggled to gain market share in areas where it would seem a natural candidate, such as in drug discovery, where point sensors are already much favored. Part of the problem is that the technology remains compartively immature. “People need to respond quickly, but if the biophotonic sensor sends out an alarm and you still have to go back to conventional technology to confirm that it’s real, you’ve lost valuable time,” said Krohn. “We need to demonstrate that the technology is reliable enough that we eliminate the need for people having to verify with conventional technology.”
As a result, homeland securirty applications remain some ways off. “The problem with taking it from doing pharmaceutical and clinical work to homeland security is that you need a network of these. I don’t want point sensors — I need multiples — and I need them integrated together,” Krohn said. Key to overcoming these problems, he said, is microarray technology. The hope is that microarrays will enable biophotonic sensing technology to monitor over 2000 pathogens, detect toxins in minutes rather than hours, and simultaneously monitor multiple pathogens with reduced amounts of testing material. “There’s a lot of innovation needed in materials technology, the substrates and how to preserve these things so that they are viable for some period of time.”
-read more in Kipp Lynch’s industry report
