Collaboration on Target Validation for Drug Development

A collaboration has been announced by biotechnology company mice & more (Hamburg, Germany) and pharmaceutical company Schering AG (Berlin, Germany) to conduct target validation for a new therapeutic concept. This method examines the properties of a given protein or target in mice that may lead to a novel pharmaceutical.

Schering has identified a protein that could serve as the starting point for a new therapeutic strategy. Researchers at mice & more are testing whether the loss of this protein leads to the desired therapeutic result in mice--by simulating the effect of a pharmaceutical that inhibits this protein--and whether this creates any undesirable side effects. Because humans and mice are 98% genetically identical, the results should be applicable to humans.

If the given approach is confirmed by the study, the search for the substance affecting the protein in the desired manner will begin. Since the exact structure and function of the target are known, substance selection will be significantly simplified. During a third stage, mice will be used once again to examine whether the pharmaceutical is both effective and tolerated. Only after this step will clinical testing begin on human patients.

"Using mice models, new therapeutic concepts can be examined much more realistically than with conventional procedures,” said Prof. Martin Schneider, head of Enabling Technologies at Schering. "As a result, the disease relevance of the target is substantiated and failure occurs less frequently.”




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