The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), Office of Acquisition (OA) on behalf of the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), NIH Chemical Genomics Center (NCGC), intends to negotiate and award a purchase order on a noncompetitive sole source basis to Cisbio Bioassays US, 135 South Road, Bedford, MA, 01730 for the procurement of three (3) Phospho Akt (ser473) - 50,000 tests.

The mission of the NCGC is to apply the tools of small molecule screening and discovery to the development of chemical probe research tools, for use in the study of protein and cell functions, and biological processes relevant to physiology and disease. NCGC will optimize biochemical, cellular and model organism-based assays submitted by the biomedical research community; perform automated high-throughput screening (HTS); and perform chemistry optimization on confirmed hits to produce chemical probes for dissemination to the research community.

The sole source determination is based upon the fact that Cisbio Bioassays US does not distribute this item to any other resellers; as such, Cisbio Bioassays US is the sole provider of this particular reagent. Additionally, the pSer473 AKT HTRF® Cisbio assay consists of reagents labeled proprietary fluorophores. Akt is an important kinase enzyme involved in cell growth, survival, proliferation and differentiation. Phosphorylation of AKT at the amino acid Ser473 is a critical regulatory step of AKT activity. NCGC has done extensive work to miniaturize the assay to 1536-well format and demonstrated that it produces robust data using the HTS capabilities at NCGC by doing pilot screens with small compound collections. The current HTRF® Cisbio assay is ready for HTS at NCGC. At this moment, there is no alternative assay available to measure pSer473 AKT that would allow NCGC to screen of a large collection of compounds (400,000). NCGC must use the same variables in the assays to maintain integrity from the data and to achieve the desired outcomes. This item has been purchased in the past from this vendor only, as no one else can provide these specific reagents. All the assay optimization was performed with the HTRF® kits. Going forward, the screening needs to be done with the same reagents in order to yield comparable and readily interpretable results. A switch to a different detection reagent would necessitate re-optimizing the assay with no guarantees that the results would be similar. This would entail unacceptable substantial time delays and enormous additional costs.

Industry Classification (NAICS) Code is 333999, with business size standard 500 Employees. The acquisition is being conducted under FAR Part 13, simplified acquisition procedures, therefore the requirements of FAR Part 6 B Competitive Requirements are not applicable (FAR Part 6.001) and the resultant purchase order will include all applicable provisions and clauses in effect through the Federal Acquisition Circular (FAC) 05-54 (November 2, 2011). This acquisition is set-aside for small business.

This notice of intent is not a request for competitive proposals. Interested parties may identify their interest and capabilities in response to this synopsis, by January 9, 2012, 7:30 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. The determination by the Government not to compete the proposed contract based upon responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government. Information received will normally be considered solely for the purpose of determining whether to conduct future competitive procurement.
Inquires to this announcement, referencing synopsis number, NHGRI-CSB-(HG)-2012-050-RSF may be submitted to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, Office of Acquisition, Procurement Branch, 6701 Rockledge Drive, Suite 6149, Bethesda, Maryland 20892-7902, Attention: Rashida Ferebee. Response may be submitted electronically to [email protected]. Faxes will not be accepted. Responses will only be accepted if dated and signed by an authorized company representative.