Pangyo, Gyeonggi, 19 Jan, 2017 | Institut Pasteur Korea (IPK) announces an open call on IPK’s proprietary award-winning ‘Phenomic Technologies’ and services that accelerate research programs focused on the discovery of first-in-class drug candidates. IPK’s ‘Phenomic Technologies*’, next-generation drug discovery technology platforms PhenomicScreen™ and PhenomicID™, combine advances from the latest bio-imaging techniques with high throughput screening technologies, to enable the real-time observation and analysis of cellular disease models in a high throughput mode. IPK can also identify previously unknown target genes associated with diseases and find new compounds that can serve as leads for innovative drug discovery.


    *Phenomic Technologies: next-generation drug discovery technology platforms

     PhenomicScreen™ - a visual– and cell-based high throughput/ high content target-free
     screening platform. It quantifies biological events in living cells and allows the cells
     themselves to identify the most effective drug targets from millions of complex molecular
     interactions.

     PhenomicID™ - assesses the impact of genes in the cell by turning off each gene, one by
     one. The entire human genome and focused gene sets are available for screening using
     cell imaging technology to identify physiologically-relevant molecular pathways and targets
     involved in the development of the phenotype of the diseases under study.

 

For over a decade, IPK’s ‘Phenomic Technologies’ and services have been employed by many distinguished international and Korean organizations. Since 2007, IPK has been a collaborator in DNDi’s neglected tropical diseases research and in 2016, IPK received recognition as DNDi’s Project of the Year for screening and analysis expertise in the multilateral collaborative NTD (neglected tropical diseases) Drug Discovery Booster. Domestically, IPK is a proud partner with the Gyeonggi Provincial Government in a joint research project to discover novel treatments for diseases in collaboration with 5 Gyeonggi based pharmaceutical/biotech companies. ‘Phenomic Technologies’ was also employed in the discovery of Q203, a novel compound highly effective against both multi-drug-resistant (MDR) and extensively drug-resistant (XDR) Mycobacterium tuberculosis (TB) currently being tested as a first-in-class drug candidate by the US FDA and identifying a Thiophene Urea (TU) compound series that has the potential to be a first-in-class hepatitis C virus drug candidate.  

 

Using Phenomic Technologies, my team enables target identification for drug development, biomarkers, and elucidation of disease mechanisms and discovery of small molecules. We can quickly identify and optimize candidate compounds and narrow the search field, filling the pipeline with drug targets with true potential. In the race to find the next first-in-class drug, being able to quickly move along the drug discovery process can potentially save time, money and lives,” said David Shum, Team Leader of Assay Development and Screening, IPK.

                                     

 

IPK employs dynamic robotic platforms for high-throughput screening of chemical libraries and RNAi collections. Fully-automated robotic platforms are located in BSL-2+ (moderate infectious) and BSL-3 (highly infectious) laboratories suitable for most pathogens and biological research. IPK is capable of screening assays covering a wide range of detection technologies including fluorescent, bioluminescence, absorbance, and imaging. Currently IPK’s chemical libraries for screening covers 400,000+ compounds including synthetics and natural products.

 

To find more information, you can visit IPK website or contact RTM team (031-8018-8000 | RTV-DIV@ip-korea.org).

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About Institut Pasteur Korea
Institut Pasteur Korea (IPK) is an international research institute focused on addressing global health issues with a combination of cutting edge approaches in order to understand disease mechanisms and develop new treatments. By promoting multi-disciplinary projects, IPK is at the forefront of drug discovery and an economic growth engine that contributes to Korea’s scientific intellectual and technical resources. IPK has four core missions of public interest – 1) Research, combining front line biology, IT, and chemistry, with innovative cell-based drug discovery platforms that identify novel molecular targets for potential new therapies to treat diseases, 2) Education, offering a wide range of programming to nurture the development of the next generation of scientists and health professionals, 3) Public Health, working in collaboration with national and international health authorities, and 4) Translation of biomedical discoveries to improve health via technology transfer and industrial partnerships.
 
IPK is a member of the Institut Pasteur International Network (Network). As a hub institution, IPK plays a key role in the Network, serving as a bridge between Korea and global bio-pharma science, expanding Korea’s R&D base collaborative research projects with global alliances
 
The institute was established in April 2004 in collaboration with Institut Pasteur Paris and the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), with support from the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning (MSIP). IPK also has a great supporter in the Gyeonggi Provincial government (2005 – 2015 : Block funding | 2016 – Present : drug discovery co-resarch fund for pharm industries).