By Christian Mignot

While the months following Sept. 11 saw significant declines for businesses in industries such as aviation, some companies experienced increases in profits as a direct result of the war on terrorism.

Cepheid, co-founded and currently chaired by Los Altos Hills resident Tom Gutshall, received a boost in sales for its centerpiece product, the Smart Cycler, a device that analyzes DNA in biological samples and matches them with the DNA of known organisms.

The product is primarily used in emergency rooms to examine organic samples from patients, reducing the time needed to determine sample contents from several days to about 30 minutes. It is also sold to researchers and educational institutions, and was even used for drug screening in the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Games.

During the anthrax threat that followed 9/11, a new, improved Smart Cycler was developed. Its use was geared toward detecting the lethal virus in suspicious organic samples found in government offices.

“We had the basic technology before the attacks, but last year we sped up the development of an improved automated device to have them out for use,” Gutshall said.

The Smart Cycler was supplied to government agencies nationwide including the U.S. Department of Defense. It was used to detect the strain of anthrax found on a letter sent to Senator Tom Daschle.

Gutshall, who has worked in the Bay Area as a chemical engineer for more than 20 years, originally developed the device by modifying and improving equipment leased from the Lawrence Livermore laboratories. In the automated version of the Smart Cycler, the user only has to input the sample, after which the device extracts and analyzes the DNA, comparing the strain with the DNA of a pre-selected organism to determine a match.

“The same work would normally have to be done by six people in a lab full of heavy equipment,” Gutshall said. “Now it’s a portable suitcase-sized device that can be transported everywhere and can even be run off a battery.”

Aside from his work with Cepheid, Gutshall is also the chairman of CityTeam Ministries, a non-profit organization seeking to help the homeless and disadvantaged in cities across the nation. He will speak at a 7 a.m. breakfast, Thursday, about the daily challenge of applying his faith to business and life, at the DoubleTree Hotel in San Jose. For more information, call (408) 947-8053 or logon to www.strategyforliving.com.