The Institut de cancérologie Gustave Roussy (IGR) France announced that its Genomic Center has been awarded ISO 9001 certification for quality management and compliance to the highest standards of quality by Association Française de Normalisation (AFNOR), France’s national organization for standardization and certification. The IGR Genomic Center is the first academic Agilent-Certified Service Provider in the world to receive this prestigious certification. IGR is also a European Reference and Training Center for Agilent, running the complete portfolio of Agilent’s microarray technologies.

Professor Gilles Vassal, Director of the Clinical and Translational Research at the Institut Gustave Roussy, said: “The ISO 9001 certificate will impact on our overall performance and efficacy, and bring further reassurance of the standard of our research and services. Both laboratory and bioinformatic processes have been certified, allowing us to reinforce our biomarker discovery strategies.”

Dr Vladimir Lazar, Head of Institut Gustave Roussy’s Genomic Center, added: “The compliance with the ISO 9001 certificate, coupled with the outstanding performances of Agilent’s genomic technologies, including Comparative Genomic Hybridization (CGH), gene expression and microRNA profiling microarrays, serves to assure our partners and customers of the highest quality of our services.”

The IGR Genomic Center, officially opened in 2002 by Claudie Haigneré in her capacity as Ministry of Research, first achieved Agilent-Certified Service Provider status for gene expression microarrays in 2005. In 2008, IGR expanded its expertise as an Agilent-Certified Service Provider and Reference Training Center for a broader panel of microarray technologies including CGH, one-color and dual-color gene expression, and microRNA profiling. The center is also authorized to perform training for the same technologies that meets Agilent certification standards.

“A few years after it was established, the IGR Genomic Center, has become a strong and important French and European research center with significant contribution to the progress of biomedical knowledge,” said Claudie Haigneré, today’s President of Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie et du Palais de la Découverte, who conducted the certification award ceremony.

“We congratulate the Institut Gustave Roussy on this significant accomplishment,” said Frédéric Laget, senior director at Agilent Technologies. “The ISO 9001 certification is a confirmation of the commitment to quality and its customers that IGR has demonstrated during its long-standing partnership with Agilent.”

About the Institut de cancérologie Gustave Roussy
The Institut Gustave Roussy (IGR, Villejuif, France), European leading Comprehensive Cancer Center, is a non profit academic entity belonging to the French public hospital service and that is authorized to receive donations and legacies. IGR is a center wholly patient-oriented with a global expertise and the mission to fight cancer. Located South of Paris on a single site, IGR employs 2,300 professionals working in care, research and teaching. Some IGR figures: 385 beds and places for day-cases,207 certified physicians, 887 professional caregivers, 151,000 consultations and 43,000 patients cared per year, 14 basic research units, 300 research scientists, and 2800 students, researchers and physicians trained per year. www.igr.fr

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