The advances in genomics and high throughput chemistry technologies have fueled the need for more rapid and biologically relevant methods to validate and prioritize lead compounds for new medicine development. Since much of the cost of drug development is due to drug failures (90% of drugs that enter clinical trials fail to become approved), providing better information earlier in the discovery process will result in significant cost savings for pharmaceutical companies and lower prices for consumers. BioSeek, Inc. is developing robust biological screening systems that provide in-depth biological information with improved pathophysiological relevance. BioMAP systems, based on Biological Multiplexed Activity Profiling, utilize primary human cell cultures in which multiple disease-relevant pathways are simultaneously active for characterization of chemical and genetic regulators of cell functions. High throughput cell profiling in a robust ELISA format using optimized proprietary sets of parameter measurements is used to rapidly identify drug mechanisms of action, off-target activities and preliminary cytotoxicity.
The specific aims of this proposal include 1) scale up of an inflammation BioMAP assay systems suitable for screening compounds; 2) development of analytical tools that allow rapid identification of mechanism of action identification; 3) expansion of the database of reference compound activities; and 4) performance of pilot studies for discovery of novel therapeutic lead compounds. ? ?

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)
Type
Small Business Innovation Research Grants (SBIR) - Phase II (R44)
Project #
5R44AI048255-03
Application #
6747340
Study Section
Special Emphasis Panel (ZRG1-SSS-U (10))
Program Officer
Prograis, Lawrence J
Project Start
2000-07-01
Project End
2005-05-31
Budget Start
2004-06-01
Budget End
2005-05-31
Support Year
3
Fiscal Year
2004
Total Cost
$310,042
Indirect Cost
Name
Bioseek, Inc.
Department
Type
DUNS #
830570748
City
South San Francisco
State
CA
Country
United States
Zip Code
94080
Berg, Ellen L; Hytopoulos, Evangelos; Plavec, Ivan et al. (2005) Approaches to the analysis of cell signaling networks and their application in drug discovery. Curr Opin Drug Discov Devel 8:107-14
Butcher, Eugene C; Berg, Ellen L; Kunkel, Eric J (2004) Systems biology in drug discovery. Nat Biotechnol 22:1253-9