Encore Pharmaceuticals Receives Phase 2 SBIR Award
Genetic Engineering News - The Leading Publication in Biotechnology
UPDATED 8/9/2005 1:54:00 PM EST
Encore Pharmaceuticals Receives Phase 2 SBIR AwardEncore Pharmaceuticals Inc. (EncorePharma) announced today that it is the recipient of a Phase 2 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) award from the National Institute on Aging (NIH-NIA) in the field of neuroinflammation. The $750,000 grant award will support continued collaborative research and development between EncorePharma researchers Dr. Elaine Benaksas Schwartz, principal investigator, and Drs. Kenneth Hensley and Robert Floyd, researchers at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation (OMRF) in Oklahoma City.
The Phase 2 award will progress early pharmaceutical development activities with a lead drug candidate for use in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease) and Huntington's disease. The molecule was identified in a previous EncorePharma and OMRF collaboration under an SBIR Phase 1 award. In addition, the Phase 2 grant award will support the ongoing effort of EncorePharma and its collaborators to identify natural products and natural-product-derived small molecules for use in large-market neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease
"This award further validates the research work that has been conducted over the last 18 months and was partially supported by an SBIR Phase 1 grant. We will now move quickly into the first stages of pre-clinical development with E-8110, our first lead therapeutic candidate in this area," stated Dr. Barbara Loughman, president of EncorePharma.
"A targeted, high-quality biochemical approach was the centerpiece of our early research and SBIR Phase 1 collaboration with EncorePharma," said Floyd, who heads OMRF's Free Radical Biology and Aging Research Program. "With the SBIR 2 award, our first lead candidates from this approach can be evaluated as potential new therapies for age-associated decline in Neurologic and cardiovascular function."
About EncorePharma
A privately owned biopharmaceutical research and development company with offices located in California and Ohio, EncorePharma www.encorepharma.com is focused on the discovery and early development of proprietary technology in both the pharmaceutical and nutritional fields. EncorePharma's research and development of lead drug and product candidates is focused on treatment of the major disorders associated with aging such as metabolic syndrome, cancer, neurodegenerative diseases and cardiovascular disease.
About OMRF
OMRF www.omrf.org is a nonprofit biomedical research institute dedicated to understanding and curing human disease. Its scientists focus on such critical research areas as cancer, Alzheimer's disease and cardiovascular disease.
CONTACT:
Encore Pharmaceuticals Inc. Dietmar Baur, 951-780-8009 dbaur@encorepharma.com
Email article to a colleague Printer friendly version
© 2004 Genetic Engineering News, All Rights Reserved terms of use legal information privacy statement