A NEW bioscience firm which hopes to produce kits to diagnose "new" diseases and to detect genetically-modified organisms is coming to York, it was revealed today.

The city's inward investment agency, york-england.com, has announced the imminent arrival of Yorkshire Bioscience Ltd, which has located in the Biocentre in York Science Park.

Slava Pavlovets, a Russian biotechnologist, has moved from London to York to create his new company, which will manufacture and supply reagents and consumables to the British bioscience community, as well as carry out research. The firm will employ highly-skilled scientists to do work for its customers, including hospitals and universities.

Dr Pavlovets said the company was leading the trend towards buying in biotech research services.

He said: "We can save researchers' time, money and effort by providing products such as nucleic acids, proteins and nucleotides - the essential 'fuels' for much laboratory work such as DNA manipulation, gene expression and specific proteins detection. This allows the researchers to concentrate in their own specialist areas."

The firm will also carry out its own research, and hopes to develop kits which will diagnose newly-emerged infectious diseases like SARS, as well as ones to detect traces of genetically modified organisms in food.

Yorkshire Bioscience Ltd is now seeking academic and industry scientists to collaborate in the research, as well as investors to support it.

Dr Pavlovets said: "We are looking forward to using the excellent research facilities of the University of York, and we are keen to increase the number of our services involving local scientists."

The arrival of the new firm in York has been welcomed by the business community.

Dave Taylor, marketing director of york-england.com, said: "Dr Pavlovets first showed his research skill to me when choosing York as the location for his business. He had visited most of the UK's bioscience clusters to find the optimum solution for a combination of research excellence, access to his target markets, superb laboratory facilities and the quality of life for him and his family."

Carolyn Randall, business promoter of Science City York, said: "We're very pleased to see a new addition to the bioscience community in York and welcome Dr Pavlovets' aspirations to work with other local experts in some of the key bioscience areas in York."

Updated: 11:34 Tuesday, May 11, 2004