Neuralstem, MetriGenix agree development program for neurochips

09-Aug-2001

Neuralstem will contribute content from its discovery efforts using its proprietary human CNS stem cells. MetriGenix will provide the relevant intellectual property and know-how associated with the Flow-thru Chip technology. The resulting stem cell-based neurochips will be offered to the CNS drug discovery and development community for research and screening purposes. Financial terms of the joint development program were not disclosed.

Neuralstem's human, highly characterized CNS stem cells have undergone expression analysis throughout all stages of development, through disease model assays, and under CNS drug influences. This genomic information is designed to assist pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies in identifying drug candidates with potentially less toxicity and more direct activity on CNS targets. This combination of microarray technology and human CNS gene information is ideal for screening compounds for their bioactivity and toxicity. Neuralstem's human CNS stem cell lines will be made available to Flow-thru Chip customers for proprietary discovery efforts and follow-up screening and validation.

"Smaller, less expensive, focused-content microarrays are clearly going to play an important role in drug discovery," said Neuralstem President and CEO Richard Garr. "MetriGenix's unique platform will enable companies to move to high-throughput genomic target screening. Our jointly developed products will allow companies to screen against genomic targets identified from experiments on our human CNS stem cell-derived neurons."

Dr. Andrew O'Beirne, Dr.P.H., MetriGenix's President and CEO, commented, "We are very excited to announce this collaboration with Neuralstem to bring together the patented Flow-thru Chip platform with Neuralstem's proprietary, patented, human neural cell system technology. This combination will provide a unique gene expression platform for the evaluation of drug interactions and for the study of CNS diseases. We believe that this partnership has the potential to provide a product offering that is not only unique, but which also can be of significant benefit to the study and treatment of neurological disease."

https://www.chemeurope.com/en/news/4234/neuralstem-metrigenix-agree-development-program-for-neurochips.html