LION Submits First Patent Application on Lead Compounds
Acceleration Through IT-Driven Drug Discovery Confirmed
HEIDELBERG, Germany and SAN DIEGO, Aug. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- LION bioscience AG (Nasdaq: LEON; Neuer Markt: LIO, WKN 504 350) announced today that it has filed its first application for patent protection on a lead compound series after only sixteen months from starting its drug discovery activities. This exciting result confirms the acceleration that can be achieved by applying integrated IT-solutions in research for drug discovery. The tight integration of information driven biological research, assay development, computational chemistry with advanced combinatorial chemistry yielded a significant improvement throughout the entire process from gene to lead.
The filed compounds have a potent activity against an undisclosed nuclear receptor and are derived entirely from LION's own proprietary chemical libraries and synthesis. Nuclear receptors are responsible for the maintenance of metabolic balance in the body. They provide numerous opportunities for the development of therapies against, for example, metabolic and endocrine disorders. LION plans to out-license its drug candidates to a pharmaceutical company for further clinical development.
``We are very pleased that our first lead generation project already led to success after only 16 months, as it shows the potential for improvement that we can exploit using our IT-driven drug discovery platform,'' said Dr. Jan Mous, Chief Scientific Officer of LION bioscience. ``It also demonstrates the successful integration of our biology and chemistry expertise in Heidelberg and San Diego which was started in February of this year: Even after this short time and across continents, we are fully functional.''
This project is the first of a series of lead generation projects directed at the target class of nuclear receptors. LION's technology platform applies a set of computational chemistry algorithms to select a limited set of compounds with high probability to bind to the target of interest. Due to the tight integration of in silico and synthetic chemistry, LION's researchers can shorten the lead generation cycles of iterative screening, data analysis and chemical synthesis and therefore pursue more projects in parallel. The iDEA(TM) software suite allows for the prediction of the adsorption, distribution, excretion and metabolism of pharmacological compounds in the human body and supports the selection of leads that have the highest probability of the appropriate pharmacokinetic properties.
``The results of this first lead generation project are impressive,'' says Dr. John Kiely, Vice President Chemistry of LION bioscience. ``Right after we started implementing the assays for the identified target from our colleagues in Heidelberg, the first screens began by the end of March and now we already have a series of high affinity / high selectivity compounds with well predicted pharmacokinetic properties. This could only be achieved through the intense use of computational chemistry and our iDEA(TM) suite.''
About LION bioscience AG:
LION bioscience (http://www.lionbioscience.com) provides proven information and knowledge management solutions to significantly improve life science R&D performance and productivity. These solutions integrate all R&D disciplines, spanning from genetics to early and late discovery through clinical trials. LION applies these solutions for its internal drug discovery program in the field of nuclear receptors with the goal to out-license specific databases, polymorphism marker panels, and validated targets and leads.
Founded in 1997, LION, together with its consolidated subsidiaries, has more than 465 employees, with headquarters in Heidelberg, Germany, and subsidiaries in Cambridge, UK, Cambridge, MA, USA and San Diego, CA, USA. To date, LION has established partnerships with leading life science companies, including Aventis, Bayer, Boehringer Ingelheim, Celera, DuPont, GlaxoSmithKline, GMD, Janssen, Merck Inc., Nestle, Novartis, Paradigm Genetics, Pharmacia & Upj |
