Will be used to fund the company's intracellular molecular imaging (IMI) project, one of 70 selected from 400 applications for funding in the area of biology and healthcare technological innovation
Cisbio international, a global developer of HTRF technology and services used in assay development and drug screening, has been awarded a research and development grant by France's National Research Agency (ANR).
The grant, totaling $1.9 million, will be used to fund the company's intracellular molecular imaging (IMI) project, one of 70 selected from 400 applications submitted to the ANR to receive research funding in the area of biology and healthcare technological innovation.
Cisbio's IMI project aims to establish a technology compatible with high-throughput screening (HTS) which will enable the quantification of biomolecular interactions in living cells, specifically targeting G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs), one of the most important targets in pharmaceutical research.
Technologies involved in the discovery process of new molecules are becoming increasingly important, particularly if they are compatible with HTS.
However, existing technologies show limitations, require specific equipment and expensive technology licenses to use, and are not well-suited to HTS.
For this project, Cisbio is collaborating with the Institut de Genomique Fonctionnelle (IGF) in Montpellier, France, the renowned research laboratory involved in molecular pharmacology and GPCR studies, and with selected biotechnology companies.
Through this collaboration network and internal research, Cisbio will develop new techniques for tagging specific intracellular proteins of interest, new long-lived fluorescent tracers, using TR-Fret to study biological interactions in living cells.
The aim is to provide end users with an access to easily-interpreted, quantitative data on targets in living cells.
"Our research teams' know-how and their experience in developing HTRF technology allow us to envision a technique adapted to HTS which is incredibly simple compared to complex image analysis technologies," said Gerard Mathis, director of R+D of Cisbio international.
Mathis, appointed director of R+D in 2006 following a 20-year career at the company, was previously director of R+D of Cisbio's in vitro technologies division when the IMI project was submitted to the ANR, and pioneered the TR-Fret technology on which Cisbio's HTRF technology is based.
"Our first applications will address unmet needs in the functional study of a specific class of GPCRs, and we also envision increasing our involvement in academic research as a result".
The ANR was created in 2005 to fund promising research projects in France.
Specific programmes support both public and private research s and businesses, with a goal to generate partnerships between the two.
In 2005, 35 "calls for projects" (appels a projets, or AAPs) were made based on scientific and economic criteria, resulting in the submission of 5400 project applications in five different sectors.
Approximately 400 applications were submitted for the biology and healthcare sector's three technological innovation AAP's, and Cisbio's was one of 70 chosen.
This grant selection was made following a peer review by a selection of international industrial and academic experts and biotechnology companies in the respective AAP's field.
