GAITHERSBURG, MD – OpGen Inc., a commercial phase genomics company, has closed  a $17 million Series B equity financing.

The new round of financing was led by jVen Capital with participation from the company’s other major investors, including CHL Medical Partners, Highland Capital Partners, Mason Wells Biomedical and Versant Ventures.

In conjunction with this financing, Evan Jones, managing member of jVen Capital, will lead OpGen’s board as executive chairman. Jones was previously an OpGen board member and has also served as interim chief executive officer of the company.

The company’s Argus Optical Mapping System, which was commercially launched in June 2010, is a platform for automated, microbial whole genome analysis. The system utilizes Optical Mapping Technology to generate ordered, whole genome genetic maps from single DNA molecules.

Unlike current methods, Optical Mapping is not a gel, PCR or sequencing-based approach. Rather, it is a unique technology for generating whole genome, high resolution genetic maps that can be used in strain typing, comparative genomics and whole genome sequence assembly.

Scientists are able to use Argus Optical Maps to view and compare bacterial genomes to each other as well as to in silico sequences. For the first time, researchers can see relationships that would not be detected by other technologies.

The financing is yet another in the string of biotech, medical device, and healthcare firms funded in Maryland this year.

We need to have a talk with the Maryland Biotech Center about the noticeable surge in the life science industry space there in the last year or so.