Ultima UG200 Chosen for 80,000-Sample UK Biobank Immune Study

In an announcement dated October 19, 2026, Ultima Genomics said its UG200 Sequencing Platform has been selected to power a large-scale single-cell immune profiling study with IMU Biosciences and UK Biobank, covering an initial 80,000 blood samples from UK Biobank participants and producing a foundational immune dataset intended for AI research. IMU Biosciences announced the collaboration from London the same day, naming UK Biobank, Waters Corporation and Ultima Genomics as collaborators.

The study combines IMU’s High Definition (HD) Immunology platform with Waters Corporation’s BD FACSDiscover Cell Analyzer and BD Rhapsody single-cell multiomics platforms, with Ultima’s UG200 producing the project’s sequencing readouts. The use of Waters’ flow cytometry and multi-omic instrumentation falls under a strategic partnership between IMU and Waters announced in June 2026.

The initial cohort comprises 80,000 blood samples from UK Biobank participants, with a stated ambition to expand profiling across UK Biobank’s full cohort of 500,000 participants. Over time, data generated through the study will be returned to UK Biobank and made available to approved researchers under UK Biobank’s established access procedures, adding a high-resolution immune profiling layer…