The development and introduction of new therapeutics and topical microbicides against HIV remains a high public health priority. To assist in filling these public health gaps, the NIAID supports preclinical development of promising therapeutic and topical microbicide candidates that emerge from academia, the private sector, or other sources. This contract provides product development services utilizing biochemical and cell-based assays in both standard and high throughput screening (HTS) formats. The services provided under this contract will assist a wide variety of investigators in obtaining critical data needed to acquire additional funding, gain prospective partnerships (either for further development or to support Phase I trials), and fulfill regulatory agency requirements for investigational new drug (IND) applications. Assay development and validation will be conducted in order to identify and evaluate the efficacy of anti-HIV therapeutics and topical microbicides. The primary activity is for the development and validation of cell-based assays as potential interventional agents including therapeutics and topical microbicides.
