Gentris and Nanogen Enter Into Development Site Collaboration

The Companies Will Collaborate to Develop and Commercialize Assay Products In the Pharmacogenomic Space For the Drug Development Industry

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. and SAN DIEGO, Feb 5, 2002 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX/ -- Gentris Corporation, a clinical pharmacogenomics testing and diagnostic products company, and Nanogen, Inc. (Nasdaq: NGEN), today announced they have entered into a Development Site Collaboration. Under the terms of the Agreement, Nanogen will provide its NanoChip(R) Molecular Biology Workstation to Gentris as part of the joint development effort, which it will use in combination with its current applications, to develop one or more commercially viable, SNP assays. These assays may be used by clinical research laboratories to test for genetic markers in order to predict drug response during clinical development studies. Nanogen will have exclusive commercialization rights to assays developed under the Agreement and will provide Gentris with certain payments resulting from the sale of such products.

"The NanoChip(R) is an open platform ideally suited for researchers who require the flexibility of a user-friendly, customizable chip to design in-house applications," said Michael Murphy, Chief Executive Officer of Gentris. "We believe this technology will add significant value to our services and products by allowing us to further develop accurate, reliable and cost-effective assays. Gentris and Nanogen will initially target clinical research customers for assays resulting from the Agreement, which we will seek to develop as turnkey, 'off the shelf' solutions. Eventually, with the proper approval from the FDA, we would like to target customers in the clinical diagnostic market."

"We believe Gentris' expertise and experience in developing clinically relevant pharmacogenomic products will help Nanogen develop and commercialize important new tests using our technology and allow us to enter the clinical pharmacogenomic market," said Randy White, Chief Executive Officer of Nanogen. "Gentris is a new and exciting company in the pharmacogenomic clinical application industry. Development site agreements, such as this one, help expand our pipeline of future NanoChip(R) applications as we continue our pursuit of near-term opportunities in molecular diagnostics."

About Gentris Corporation:

Gentris Corporation is engaged in the development and rapid commercialization of innovative proprietary clinical pharmacogenomic products and services. The company provides global pharmaceutical research organizations with turnkey pharmacogenomic solutions to improve the efficiency and predictability of drug development. The ultimate benefit to these organizations is to shorten drug development cycles, improve new drug approval rates, and allow drugs that might have otherwise been abandoned advance towards final approval and be prescribed to a targeted subset of the population. In the near future, the company will develop specialized, high quality, reliable diagnostic products, which will provide physicians and their patient's access to pharmacogenomic testing, as personalized medicine becomes the new standard of medical practice. For additional information, please visit Gentris' website at www.gentris.com.

About Nanogen:

Nanogen's goal is to become the leading provider of electronic microarray technology with the required accuracy, simplicity and flexibility necessary to bridge the gap between the research and clinical setting in genomics-based diagnostics. The Company is seeking to establish the NanoChip(R) System as the standard platform for the detection of genetic mutations and to develop applications for future clinical use. To date, the Company has developed and internally validated five research protocols, four associated with cardiovascular disease and one associated with Hereditary Hemochromatosis, the most common form of iron overload disease. Nanogen markets its NanoChip(R) Molecular Biology Workstation to scientists and genomics laboratories. The NanoChip(R) System is intended for research use only and not for use in diagnostic procedures. For additional information please visit Nanogen's web site at www.nanogen.com.

This press release contains forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those set forth in the forward-looking statements, including whether Nanogen's NanoChip(R) System can be successfully commercialized, whether products under development can be successfully developed and commercialized, whether results reported by customers or partners can be identically replicated, whether Development Sites will result in future sales of Nanogen's NanoChip(R) System, whether regulatory clearances or approvals will be obtained, whether Nanogen will be successful in developing additional protocols, whether Nanogen will be successful in developing FDA approved molecular diagnostic tests utilizing the NanoChip(R) System, and other risks and uncertainties discussed under the caption "Factors That May Affect Results" and elsewhere in Nanogen's Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2000, as amended, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date hereof. Nanogen and Gentris disclaims any intent or obligation to update these forward-looking statements.

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SOURCE Gentris Corporation; Nanogen, Inc.

CONTACT: Jennifer Crean, Executive Director, Business Development of Gentris Corporation, +1-919-465-0100, ext. 14, or creanj@gentris.com; or Gerard A. Wills, Vice President and CFO of Nanogen, +1-858-410-4605, or gwills@nanogen.com; or Scott Place of Maverick Marketing, +1-919-676-9595, or splace@maverickmarketing.com, for Gentris Corporation; or Tom Baker, Media Relations of Susan E. Atkins & Associates, +1-858-860-0266, or tbaker@irpr.com, for Nanogen URL: http://www.gentris.com http://www.prnewswire.com