Boston Biomedica Inc. (BBI) announced Thursday that it hasreceived a $280,000, two-year contract from the FDA's Centerfor Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) to supply theCBER's hepatitis lab with a series of viral hepatitis referencepanels for evaluating in vitro diagnostic test procedures.

Hepatitis test kit manufacturers also will use BBI's referencepanels for lot-to-lot release testing of FDA-licensed test kits,and for developing and evaluating new assays, BBI said.

The West Bridgewater, Mass., company manufactures andsupplies AIDS, hepatitis and other infectious disease diagnosticreagents to research and clinical labs, blood banks, diagnosticmanufacturers and regulatory agencies.

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