Neuroscience Associates Inc.

Neuroscience Associates Inc., a for-profit manufacturer and service provider based in Knoxville, Tennessee, delivers specialized neurohistology services to federal research and medical institutions as a prime contractor across 54 awards spanning two decades. The company operates exclusively as a prime (100% of awards), competing under both small business set-asides and full-and-open procurements, with recent work split between Total Small Business and non-set-aside designations.

The vendor's concrete capability is mass-production neurohistology — embedding, sectioning, immunofluorescence staining, imaging, and histological analysis of brain, spinal cord, and nervous system tissue from animal models and human samples. The company operates proprietary MultiBrain and MultiCord block-embedding technologies to support higher throughput and lower per-unit cost. Representative recent awards include a $29,836 Total Small Business purchase order from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (awarded April 2026) for neurohistology of 40 mouse brain hemispheres to support research on delayed effects of acute radiation exposure, with work performed at the vendor's Bethesda, Maryland facility and delivery by May 15, 2026; a $175,627 non-competitive purchase order from the Department of Veterans Affairs Veterans Integrated Service Network 20 (September 2021) for mouse brain neurohistology services performed in Seattle, Washington; and a $20,762 purchase order from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (September 2023) for neurohistology of SARS-CoV-2-infected and compound-treated brain organoids in support of the National Institute on Drug Abuse's research on the virus's impact on brain function and therapeutic compounds.

Customer concentration spans 21 distinct federal agencies, but 66% of combined potential value concentrates in five customers: the Food and Drug Administration (3 awards, $536 thousand), the Department of Veterans Affairs Veterans Integrated Service Network 20 (3 awards, $255 thousand), the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (7 awards, $103 thousand), the National Institute on Drug Abuse (2 awards, $99 thousand), and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Morgantown (3 awards, $89 thousand). The National Institutes of Health ecosystem — spanning NICHD, NIAID, and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences — dominates by award count (15 awards accounting for 39% of the portfolio by volume), though dollar concentration tilts toward FDA and VA work.

Combined potential value across all 54 awards stands at $1.6 million with $1.2 million obligated (75% realization). Activity has been episodic rather than sustained growth: four awards in 2019, two in 2020, three in 2021, three in 2023, and one in 2026. The vendor does not participate in parent vehicles, IDIQs, GWACs, or BPAs and carries no subcontract footprint. Primary NAICS concentration sits within research and development in biotechnology (23 awards combined across related codes) and testing laboratories and services (11 awards), with PSC framing emphasizing reference laboratory testing (19 awards).

NSA is a full-service histology laboratory, providing all phases of histo services starting with proprietary MultiBrain Technology, along with digital imaging, analysis, antibody specialization, and CRO services.