NANOGEN PRESS RELEASE

SAN DIEGO, and PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 31 -- Nanogen, Inc., (Nasdaq: NGEN) and The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia announced today that they will collaborate to develop high-accuracy genetic tests on Nanogen's platform.

Paolo Fortina, M.D., Ph.D., an investigator at the Joseph Stokes, Jr. Research Institute of The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, recently presented successful preliminary results from difficult genetic samples run on Nanogen's system at the International Forum of Biochip Technologies in Beijing. The samples included DNA insertions and deletions.

The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia is considered a world leader in caring for children with diseases caused by a deletion of DNA on chromosome 22. Chromosome 22q11.2 deletion syndrome is characterized by cardiac defects, cleft palate and feeding problems, among other things. Because physicians at Children's Hospital care for hundreds of children with this and other genetic diseases, access to fast and accurate genetic tests is an important component of the Hospital's clinical and research programs.

The object of the Nanogen/Children's Hospital collaboration is to accelerate development of clinical diagnostics assays on Nanogen's unique DNA microchips, potentially leading toward higher quality, more timely diagnostic results. This is the first collaboration announced under Nanogen's Development Site Program. Under the agreement, Children's Hospital will provide laboratory resources, collaborative expertise and product revenue in exchange for non-exclusive access to Nanogen's electronic DNA microarray technology. Nanogen and Children's Hospital have also agreed to publish and present the validated study results. Children's Hospital intends to develop genetic tests using Nanogen's NanoChip(TM) platform for use in the hospital's clinical laboratories.

"I have been utilizing microarray technologies for several years," said Dr. Fortina, of the Hematology Division at Children's Hospital and an associate professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. "When evaluating the NanoChip(TM) technology, Nanogen asked for us to submit our most difficult samples to run as a performance demonstration. We gave them several different types, including Factor VII exon 8 amino acid 353, a decanucleotide insertion/deletion at position *323 in the Factor VII promoter, MTHFR and Protein C SNP 1, 2 and 3. All samples were reported unambiguously and 100 percent correct." Dr. Fortina concluded, "We believe this technology will allow us to develop a variety of highly accurate genetic tests for the benefit of the healthcare community."

Howard Birndorf, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Nanogen commented: "The Children's Hospital of Pennsylvania has clearly demonstrated a desire to improve patient care through the use of genetically-based diagnostic assays. We are pleased that they view the NanoChip(TM) technology as a key enabling technology that may reduce the time-to-market and accuracy of a broad selection of reliable genetic tests. The objective of our relationship with the Children's Hospital is to develop new diagnostic tests that will assist medical doctors in the treatment of childhood diseases. The agreement with Children's Hospital broadens our development efforts by applying the NanoChip(TM) technology to the most challenging areas of genetic testing, clearly differentiating our product from other systems."

Microarray Technologies: New Tools for the Genomics and Post-Genomics Revolution

Human genomics, the study of the location and function of the tens of thousands of genes in every human cell, is increasingly the focus of medical and pharmaceutical research. Understanding and decoding genomes is expected to accelerate the development of diagnostic procedures and of new drugs to detect, prevent and cure disease.

Genomics is not limited to the study of human genomes. Other genomes, such as bacterial, viral, animal and plant genomes, hold commercial implications. As the DNA sequencing of genomes are completed and more genes are functionally linked to biological processes or diseases, the tools used in laboratories must be replaced or adapted to the very different standards required for post-genomics work. For example, while the priority in discovery genomics is very high throughput, in post-genomics applications, such as certain DNA diagnostic assays, the priority is accuracy and versatility.

Nanogen and its customers have found the NanoChip(TM) system produces industry-leading accuracy for scoring genetic variations in patients, including single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), insertions, deletions and repeats. The no call rate on NanoChip(TM) systems has also been very low. Other techniques permit high or very high throughput of either samples or SNPs, but most of these techniques do not work well with the other types of genetic variants. To date, the most difficult samples, such as microvariants (or mutations within DNA repeat sequences), mutations that are adjacent to secondary DNA structures, repeat regions, insertions, deletions, and scoring SNPs in genes found to have pseudogenes have been successfully analyzed on the NanoChip(TM) Molecular Biology Workstation and its multi-use consumable, the NanoChip(TM) cartridge.

Under development at Nanogen are additional applications on the NanoChip(TM) platform, including high precision gene expression monitoring from multiple experiments on the same NanoChip(TM). Gene expression currently is used primarily in research and in the near future is expected to be used routinely in clinical diagnostics if a more reproducible system becomes available.

Nanogen has established the Development Site Program to actively collaborate with selected customers in strategically important market segments (including clinical research, reference diagnostic laboratories, genomics, pharmaceutical, biotechnology and agrochemical companies) in the development of assays on the Nanogen platform. Under these agreements, collaborating companies and institutions provide expertise and/or intellectual property in exchange for early access to Nanogen's technology. After applications are validated, the collaborating institutions may purchase the NanoChip(TM) Workstation and NanoChip(TM) cartridges for use in their operations.

Founded in 1855 as the nation's first pediatric medical center, The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia is a leader in patient care, education and research. The Hospital is second in the United States among all children's hospitals in total research funding from the National Institutes of Health.

Basic research in human genetics and clinical programs for children with genetic disease are major strengths at Children's Hospital. Investigators from the Hospital, led by Beverly S. Emanuel, Ph.D., chief of the division of Human Genetics and Molecular Biology, played an important role in the milestone announced last year by the Human Genome Project, that chromosome 22 was the first human chromosome to be sequenced. Dr. Emanuel's team also has analyzed areas of genetic instability occurring in chromosome 22q11 deletion syndrome. Understanding the molecular mechanisms behind low-copy repeats will be important in an emerging field of medicine called genomic disease-conditions that originate in the structure of the genome.

Dr. Paolo Fortina is a pediatrician and Director of the clinical Molecular Pathology section at Children's Hospital. Dr. Fortina has an interest in developing microdevice-based approaches for sample preparation, gene expression profiling and the detection of genetic mutations. In collaboration with the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at The Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, his group is developing a fully-integrated microdevice which will begin with a drop of blood and end with a genetic profile of the individual. The device is intended to improve genetic testing while saving time and decreasing the costs of analysis.

Dr. Fortina's current work is aimed at implementing protocols employing microarrays in diagnostics for common inheritable genetic diseases. He also is collaborating in international studies aimed at discovering genes that regulate the switch from fetal to adult hemoglobin production as well as genes involved in inflammatory bowel disease. In another project, Dr. Fortina and Dr. Eleanor Pollak, a pathologist at the University of Pennsylvania, are studying the potential use of a microdevice to study genetic risk factors for pathological blood clotting associated with cardiovascular disease.

Nanogen recently began marketing its NanoChip(TM) Molecular Biology Workstation system to scientists and genomics laboratories, setting new standards for SNP scoring. Nanogen is developing a series of electronics-based products to help researchers and clinical healthcare providers accelerate their practical understanding and use of genomic information. The products introduced and under development are intended to provide quick and accurate analysis of DNA, RNA and proteins, "bridging" both the research and clinical diagnostic settings. For additional information please visit Nanogen's web site at http://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 the Company's NanoChip(TM) system can be or will be further successfully commercialized, whether products under development can be successfully developed and commercialized, whether results reported by our customers or partners can be identically replicated, whether the Company's collaborations will continue to be funded and other risks and uncertainties discussed under the caption "Factors That May Affect Results" and elsewhere in the Company's Form 10-K, as amended, for the year ended December 31, 1999, as amended, and subsequent reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date hereof. The Company disclaims any intent or obligation to update these forward-looking statements. The Company may, at its discretion, issue additional announcements regarding orders or sales of it NanoChip(TM) system as it deems appropriate and as required by law.

Contact: Kieran T. Gallahue, President, CFO, of Nanogen, Inc., 858-410-4600; or Page Sargisson, Media, of Noonan-Russo Communications, 415-677-4455, ext. 229, for Nanogen, Inc.

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