Galapagos Genomics and Procter & Gamble Pharmaceuticals Announce Functional Genomics Collaboration
23-Oct-2001
Galapagos Genomics NV, the Belgian functional genomics company, and Procter & Gamble Pharmaceuticals (P&GP), a division of The Procter & Gamble Company (NYSE: PG – news) today announced a collaboration in which P&GP will use Galapagos’ adenovirus technology as a tool to validate the utility of genes as new drug targets.
Under the terms of the agreement, Galapagos will supply P&GP with adenoviral vectors containing human genes selected by P&GP researchers. Galapagos will construct the recombinant adenoviruses using its PhenoSelect ® Expression platform. P&GP will use these viruses to introduce and express newly discovered genes into human cells in vitro and to evaluate the function of the proteins encoded by the genes. Financial terms of the collaboration were not disclosed.
“This very promising collaboration again emphasizes the competitive position of Galapagos in the functional genomics field and demonstrates the growing interest from the pharma and biotech industry in our proprietary adenoviral platform for target discovery and validation,” said Onno van de Stolpe, Galapagos’ CEO. “We are ple ased to contribute to P&GP’s selection of most viable drug targets in its research program. The data generated in this collaboration will enable P&GP to efficiently prioritize their collection of drug targets and maximize their drug discovery efforts.”
“This collaboration adds to our armamentarium of methods to move quickly from genomic information to the invention of important new therapeutic agents across our areas of interest in drug development” said Dr. Gordon Hassing, Procter & Gamble Vice President, Research and Development, Global Pharmaceuticals.
The use of adenovirus technology has been demonstrated to be particularly useful in the functional characterization of genes. Although there are other approaches to identify genes or gene products that are associated with a particular disease, they do not establish a causal relationship between gene and function. Recombinant adenoviral technology is a cost-effective method that directly associates human genes with phenotypic changes such as morphology, motility, proliferation, differentiation, signal transduction, enzyme and transport activity.
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