Immobilize your ligands, not your research.

A few lines of background.
The growing complexity of novel biotherapies and next-generation diagnostics is driving unprecedented analytical demands. Biosensing technologies continue to evolve, with new instruments, assay formats, and nanomaterials pushing performance further in automation, sensitivity, and throughput. But what about the biointerface and how biomolecules are immobilized on sensor surfaces?

Immobilization strategies: the SAMs
‍Three major strategies are commonly used to immobilize ligands on sensor surfaces: passive adsorption, affinity-based capture, and covalent coupling. Among the latter, covalent surface chemistries can broadly range from 2D self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) to thicker 3D polymer or hydrogel coatings. In simple terms, 2D surface chemistries use a thin, highly organized layer to prioritize control over surface interactions, while 3D surface chemistries use thicker coatings to increase loading capacity.

K-One: redifining surface chemistry.
K-One is Kimialys’ proprietary SAM technology, optimized for gold surfaces such as nanoparticles, chips, and electrodes. What sets it apart from conventional SAMs and other immobilization strategies is the level of control over surface interactions it delivers, shaped by more than ten years of research and optimization initiated at Paris-Saclay University and further developed by Kimialys. It enables simultaneous control over ligand exposure, density, distribution, and surface shielding against non-specific binding, thereby improving sensitivity, specificity, selectivity, and reproducibility without forcing the usual trade-offs between these key assay parameters. It has been at the core of Kimialys since the company’s creation in 2020 and remains the technological platform behind all our products and services today.

Kimialys: One for all, all for K-One.
On paper, it can sound almost magical, as if surface complexity could simply disappear with a touch of K-One and performance would naturally follow. As scientists, we know reality is more complex. Across such diverse applications, and with biomolecules that differ widely in structure, affinity, and behaviour, success still depends on fine-tuning multiple parameters. That is why we built a team of biophysicists and chemists under one banner. Kimialys is not just K-One as a technology; it is the scientific team that applies it, adapts it, and continuously refines it under real experimental conditions.

Surface chemistry matters more than ever.
‍To meet the stringent analytical requirements of modern drug discovery and diagnostic development, assays must deliver high-quality, reliable, and exploitable data. This is even more critical in the era of computational design, where increasingly high-affinity biomolecules with less conventional structures and behaviors are raising the bar for both characterization and detection. In this context, a partner with deep expertise in surface chemistry becomes essential for robust assay development, experimental validation, sequence refinement, and iterative model improvement.