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MetaDeq Diagnostics Announces Two Abstracts to be Presented at the EASL International Liver Congress™

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HeparDx™ is an investigational MASH (NASH) activity and liver fibrosis blood test designed to diagnose and stage patients, detect at-risk MASH and monitor treatment response to therapy

The data presentations add further evidence supporting HeparDx™ as an accurate blood test to detect liver-specific metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH)New findings independently correlate PLIN2 with inflammation and lobular ballooning in a 198-patient analysis from the previous prospective study published in Guti

LONDON and WINTER SPRINGS, Fla., June 4, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — PR Newswire – MetaDeq Ltd. and MetaDeq Diagnostics, Inc., a private medical diagnostic company developing tests for MASH (fatty liver) and liver fibrosis, announced that two posters will be presented at the European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) Congress 2024, being held June 5-8 in Milan, Italy. The presented data shed new light on the PLIN2 component of the HeparDx™ diagnostic blood test and provide a further understanding of PLIN2’s mechanism of action for detecting MASH. The abstracts can be found on the EASL website at www.easlcongress.eu and will be available for viewing on Wednesday June 5, 2024 at 8 :30am CEST.

HeparDx™ is a non-invasive blood test aimed to detect MASH activity, their individual components and liver fibrosis.

HeparDx™ is able to identify and quantify inflammation and ballooning in blood monocytes with high accuracy and correlation to liver cells as assessed by liver biopsy. This detection appears to be liver-specific and not associated with inflammation seen in subjects with cardiovascular disease (CVD). There is a clear unmet medical need to improve accuracy for non-invasive tests (NITs) for MASH. HeparDx™ is a blood test comprised of two biomarkers, one for inflammation and ballooning associated with MASH activity (PLIN2), and one for liver fibrosis (RAB14). MetaDeq believes its diagnostic blood test ultimately may enable physicians to: 1. Diagnose MASH patients before significant disease progression occurs, 2. Use it as a pre-treatment medical decision-making tool, and 3. Monitor patient response to treatment.

Prof. Sven Franque, abstract author and collaborating clinician, comments: “After encouraging data published in 2023, at this year’s Liver Congress in Milan, Poster WED-296 undertakes an important analysis to determine if PLIN2 over-expression occurs in other tissues. Cardiac tissue from subjects with cardiovascular disease generally has inflammation as a hallmark characteristic. In this dataset, PLIN2 levels are elevated in liver tissue in subjects with MASH, but not in subjects with cardiac disease; this helps provide evidence that HeparDx™ appears to be liver-specific. I look forward to seeing continued data generation in additional patient cohorts throughout this year.”

POSTER PRESENTATIONS

Title: HeparDx™ (by MetaDeq, Inc.) is a reliable biomarker of MASH capable of detecting the presence of inflammation and ballooning
Authors: Giulia Angelini, Sara Russo, Erminia Lembo, Ornella Verrastro, Antonio Liguori, Stephen Harrison, Aldo Trylesinski, Luca Miele, Geltrude Mingrone
Poster Number: WED-215
Date/Time: Wednesday, June 5th, 8:30 am CEST
Summary: PLIN2 expression is significantly increased in subjects with at-risk MASH (NAS ≥4 and clinically significant fibrosis) compared with subjects without MASH. In 198 subjects with histologically proven at-risk MASH, HeparDx™ analysis for the detection of presence/absence of MASH produced an AUROC of 96.8% vs. liver biopsy, with a sensitivity and specificity of 93.5% and 90.2%, respectively. HeparDx™ was able to detect inflammation and ballooning as individual components, each with high sensitivity and specificity.

Title: PLIN2 is a specific marker for liver related disease
Authors: Giulia Angelini, Sara Russo, Federico Biscetti, Andrea Flex, Jérôme Boursier, Sven Francque, Aldo Trylesinski, Stephen Harrison, Geltrude Mingrone
Poster Number: WED-296
Date/Time: Wednesday, June 5th, 8:30 am CEST
Summary: Plasma PLIN2 is significantly higher in subjects with MASH as compared to subjects without MASH. In 100 subjects analyzed, HeparDx™ clearly showed the ability to detect MASH activity in the liver, but in subjects with CVD and early atherosclerosis, no significantly elevated levels of PLIN2 were detected. Hence, PLIN2 appears to be specific for liver activity related to MASH and is not confounded with inflammation in other tissues, such as cardiac.

Aldo Trylesinski, M.D., Consulting Chief Medical Officer, comments: “The two posters presented at EASL further validate the scientific basis behind HeparDx™ as a non-invasive blood test aimed to detect MASH activity, their individual components and liver fibrosis. Further validation in other patient cohorts is currently ongoing, but up to now, the evidence described in these posters, coupled with the data published in Gut earlier last year, point to a very encouraging signal.”

In Memory and Acknowledgement: Earlier this year, the liver community lost a brilliant physician, leader, clinical trial investigator and true champion of patients, Dr. and Colonel (Ret.) Stephen A. Harrison. With Stephen’s passing, we at MetaDeq, and many, many others, lost a friend and advisor. Stephen’s work and insight into liver diseases will continue to inspire us. Stephen had been serving as Chair of the MetaDeq Scientific Advisory Board and was an early believer in our technology. 

About MASH (NASH)

Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) is a leading cause of cirrhosis, liver failure, liver transplant, and hepatocellular carcinoma. Liver biopsy is the diagnostic reference standard, but it is expensive, time consuming, and carries multiple risks to the patient. With the first FDA-approved therapeutic on the market, the need for a highly accurate and reliable non-invasive test (NIT) is imperative to diagnose and monitor patients on therapy. In the U.S., over 25% of adults have metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), of which 20%, or 12 million adults, will progress to MASHii. In June 2023, the American Diabetes Association recommended all 28 million people with Type 2 diabetes be tested for MASLD/MASHiii.

About HeparDx

HeparDx™ is an investigational novel blood test to accurately diagnose, stage, and monitor MASH being developed by MetaDeq Diagnostics. HeparDx™ includes two biomarkers correlated with MASH activity and fibrosis in the liver to accurately diagnose MASH patients and potentially replace liver biopsies. Clinical data from a prospective study in 250 patients undergoing liver biopsies has been peer-reviewed and published in Gut1, a leading medical journal, and multiple additional abstracts have been presented at medical congresses. HeparDx™ appears to have the potential to measure, independently, each inflammation and ballooning component in MASH vs. only steatohepatitis.

About MetaDeq Diagnostics

MetaDeq is committed to delivering diagnostics that help physicians identify, diagnose, stage and monitor MASLD and MASH patients with a simple and accurate blood test. MetaDeq’s lead product is HeparDx™, a blood test based on two biomarkers to detect MASH activity and liver fibrosis. For more information, please visit: www.metadeq.com.

Contacts

MetaDeq

Daniel Whittaker

Chief Commercial Officer

d.whittaker@metadeq.com

Oratorium Group

Juliane Snowden

Founder

jsnowden@oratoriumgroup.com

i Gut Feb 2023, 72 (2) 392-403; DOI: 10.1136/gutjnl-2022-327498

ii Int J Mol Sci, 2019; www.liverfoundation.org; Clin Diabetes and Endocrinology, 2020; Gosalia, et al, Diagnostics 2022

iii https://diabetes.org/newsroom/american-diabetes-association-releases-guideline-update-NAFLD-diabetes

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Chef Robotics Physical AI Models Can Now Automate Baked Goods Packing

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SAN FRANCISCO, April 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Chef Robotics, a leader in physical AI for the food industry, today announced that Chef robots can now automate tray assembly for baked goods packing. The application places baked products, such as burger buns, chocolate chip cookies, biscotti, butter cookies, biscuits, fortune cookies, granola bars, rusks, and shortbreads into trays and packaging containers before sealing.

Watch Chef robots in action.

Baked goods packing has historically been difficult to automate for high-mix production. Each item behaves differently on the production line—a granola bar compresses under the wrong grip, while a biscotti or rusk can crack if placed at the wrong angle. Surface textures range from glazed and smooth to crumbly and irregular, and strict presentation requirements leave little room for error. This variability has made it challenging for automation systems to reliably handle baked goods at production speeds, leaving food manufacturers dependent on manual labor and traditional bakery equipment.

To address this, Chef built its baked goods packing application on its existing piece-picking capability, which uses Chef’s AI-powered computer vision and physical AI models trained across diverse real-world production environments. This allows Chef robots to assess each item’s position, shape, and orientation in real time and determine how to pick the items from the pan and place them quickly and precisely without damaging them.

The baked goods packing application supports four distinct placement capabilities.

First, Chef’s vision system detects the angle at which each item sits in the pan and reorients it after picking, placing it on the tray at the exact angle required, regardless of its original position, enabling retail-ready presentation for SKUs that require precise angular placement.

Second, Chef robots can place multiple baked goods into the same packaging container in a single automated pass, completing full tray assembly without manual intervention.

Third, for packaging containers with multiple small compartments, Chef robots can precisely place items into each designated section, including multiple items in the same compartment, using Chef’s AI vision model to detect compartment positions and orientations in real time.

Fourth, Chef’s vision system identifies the exact center of each tray and places every item at a predefined offset from that center, ensuring a uniform, consistent arrangement across every pack regardless of how trays arrive on the conveyor.

For food manufacturers evaluating bakery systems and baked goods packaging automation, the application offers higher throughput, reduced labor dependency, and consistent presentation across shifts. The capability runs on Chef’s existing robotic hardware and software, allowing manufacturers to deploy it without requiring any changes to their production lines.

Chef’s baked goods packing application is available in the U.S., Canada, Germany, and the UK and is included as part of Chef’s robotics-as-a-service (RaaS) pricing model.

About Chef Robotics
Chef is the first company to have commercialized a scalable AI-driven food robotics solution. With over 104 million servings made in production, Chef leverages ChefOS, an AI platform for food manipulation, to offer a Robotics-as-a-Service solution that helps industry-leading food companies increase production volume and meet demand. Headquartered in San Francisco, CA, Chef aims to empower humans to do what humans do best by accelerating the advent of intelligent machines. Visit https://chefrobotics.ai to learn more.

View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/chef-robotics-physical-ai-models-can-now-automate-baked-goods-packing-302756923.html

SOURCE Chef Robotics

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Chef Robotics Physical AI Models Can Now Automate Baked Goods Packing

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SAN FRANCISCO, April 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Chef Robotics, a leader in physical AI for the food industry, today announced that Chef robots can now automate tray assembly for baked goods packing. The application places baked products, such as burger buns, chocolate chip cookies, biscotti, butter cookies, biscuits, fortune cookies, granola bars, rusks, and shortbreads into trays and packaging containers before sealing.

Watch Chef robots in action.

Baked goods packing has historically been difficult to automate for high-mix production. Each item behaves differently on the production line—a granola bar compresses under the wrong grip, while a biscotti or rusk can crack if placed at the wrong angle. Surface textures range from glazed and smooth to crumbly and irregular, and strict presentation requirements leave little room for error. This variability has made it challenging for automation systems to reliably handle baked goods at production speeds, leaving food manufacturers dependent on manual labor and traditional bakery equipment.

To address this, Chef built its baked goods packing application on its existing piece-picking capability, which uses Chef’s AI-powered computer vision and physical AI models trained across diverse real-world production environments. This allows Chef robots to assess each item’s position, shape, and orientation in real time and determine how to pick the items from the pan and place them quickly and precisely without damaging them.

The baked goods packing application supports four distinct placement capabilities.

First, Chef’s vision system detects the angle at which each item sits in the pan and reorients it after picking, placing it on the tray at the exact angle required, regardless of its original position, enabling retail-ready presentation for SKUs that require precise angular placement.

Second, Chef robots can place multiple baked goods into the same packaging container in a single automated pass, completing full tray assembly without manual intervention.

Third, for packaging containers with multiple small compartments, Chef robots can precisely place items into each designated section, including multiple items in the same compartment, using Chef’s AI vision model to detect compartment positions and orientations in real time.

Fourth, Chef’s vision system identifies the exact center of each tray and places every item at a predefined offset from that center, ensuring a uniform, consistent arrangement across every pack regardless of how trays arrive on the conveyor.

For food manufacturers evaluating bakery systems and baked goods packaging automation, the application offers higher throughput, reduced labor dependency, and consistent presentation across shifts. The capability runs on Chef’s existing robotic hardware and software, allowing manufacturers to deploy it without requiring any changes to their production lines.

Chef’s baked goods packing application is available in the U.S., Canada, Germany, and the UK and is included as part of Chef’s robotics-as-a-service (RaaS) pricing model.

About Chef Robotics
Chef is the first company to have commercialized a scalable AI-driven food robotics solution. With over 104 million servings made in production, Chef leverages ChefOS, an AI platform for food manipulation, to offer a Robotics-as-a-Service solution that helps industry-leading food companies increase production volume and meet demand. Headquartered in San Francisco, CA, Chef aims to empower humans to do what humans do best by accelerating the advent of intelligent machines. Visit https://chefrobotics.ai to learn more.

View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/chef-robotics-physical-ai-models-can-now-automate-baked-goods-packing-302756923.html

SOURCE Chef Robotics

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Air Products to Expand Industrial Gas Supply for Samsung Electronics’ Next-Generation Semiconductor Fab in South Korea

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New investment underscores the company’s long-term commitment to Korea and its leading role in the global semiconductor industry 

LEHIGH VALLEY, Pa., April 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Air Products (NYSE:APD), a world-leading industrial gases company and serving Samsung globally, today announced it has been selected by Samsung to supply industrial gases for its new advanced semiconductor fab in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province, South Korea.

Under the agreement, Air Products will build, own and operate multiple state-of-the-art production facilities and a bulk specialty gas supply system to supply nitrogen, oxygen, argon, and hydrogen for Samsung’s new semiconductor fab. The new facilities are expected to come onstream in multiple phases from 2028 through 2030.

Air Products has a long track record of executing multiple phase expansions in Pyeongtaek to support Samsung’s growing manufacturing needs. This latest project represents Air Products’ largest investment to date in the semiconductor industry and will establish Pyeongtaek as the company’s single largest operations site globally supporting the electronics industry. 

“Air Products is honored to be selected once again by Samsung and to have their continued confidence as a trusted partner supporting their strategic growth plans,” said SR Kim, President, Air Products Korea. “This significant investment reinforces Air Products’ role as a leading global supplier to the semiconductor industry and underscores our long-standing commitment to supporting our strategic customers with safety, reliability, efficiency and excellent service.”

Air Products has served the global electronics industry for more than 40 years, supplying industrial gases safely and reliably to many of the world’s leading technology companies. The company has operated in Korea for more than 50 years and has established a strong position in electronics and manufacturing sectors.

About Air Products

Air Products (NYSE: APD) is a world-leading industrial gases company in operation for over 85 years focused on serving energy, environmental, and emerging markets and generating a cleaner future. The Company supplies essential industrial gases, related equipment and applications expertise to customers in dozens of industries, including refining, chemicals, metals, electronics, manufacturing, medical and food. As the leading global supplier of hydrogen, Air Products also develops, engineers, builds, owns and operates some of the world’s largest clean hydrogen projects, supporting the transition to low- and zero-carbon energy in the industrial and heavy-duty transportation sectors. Through its sale of equipment businesses, the Company also provides turbomachinery, membrane systems and cryogenic containers globally.

Air Products had fiscal 2025 sales of $12 billion from operations in approximately 50 countries. For more information, visit airproducts.com or follow us on LinkedInXFacebook or Instagram.

This release contains “forward-looking statements” within the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are based on management’s expectations and assumptions as of the date of this release and are not guarantees of future performance. While forward-looking statements are made in good faith and based on assumptions, expectations and projections that management believes are reasonable based on currently available information, actual performance and financial results may differ materially from projections and estimates expressed in the forward-looking statements because of many factors, including the risk factors described in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2025 and other factors disclosed in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Except as required by law, we disclaim any obligation or undertaking to update or revise any forward-looking statements contained herein to reflect any change in the assumptions, beliefs or expectations or any change in events, conditions or circumstances upon which any such forward-looking statements are based.

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