February 2015
In This Issue
A Note from Jennifer
Dear WIPO Re:Search Members and Friends, 

   

Hopefully you have had the chance to read the 2014 Partnership Hub Annual Report, which we sent out recently. If you haven't read it yet, click on the link below to download a copy.


We are encouraged and excited about the successes we have seen over the first three years of WIPO Re:Search. Our Members are engaged and committed to advancing research and development of products for neglected tropical diseases, malaria, and tuberculosis. Through collaborations our Members can achieve much more than they could accomplish alone; several Members have obtained promising results and are advancing their products along the development pipeline.


Last month I traveled to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia for an African Network for Drugs and Diagnostics Innovation (ANDI) stakeholders meeting and to Johannesburg, South Africa for a meeting organized by Merck KGaA regarding schistosomiasis. During my trip, I met with scientists and leaders from many African countries and Member organizations. Everyone was very interested in learning about our programs including WIPO Re:Search and the  partnerships that could be facilitated.


I am pleased to welcome our two newest Members, the Icahn School of Medicine, Mount Sinai, and the Guangzhou Institutes of Biomedicine and Health, Chinese Academy of Sciences.


As always, please forward this Snapshot to your colleagues and reach out to us with any partnering requests or ideas. 

 

Sincerely,

 Jennifer Dent

President, BVGH 
websiteSpecial Announcement

The 2014 Partnership Hub Annual Report is now available. Download your copy here.
statsWIPO Re:Search Statistics


To view a current summary of the WIPO Re:Search agreements by disease and stage of development, click here.

Click here to view a complete list of WIPO Re:Search Members.


 

MSD* will provide Professor Alan Cowman, Dr. Justin Boddey, and Dr. Brad Sleebs, Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, with a targeted set of compounds to screen against Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium falciparum.


  


Last summer, Dr. Ellis Owusu-Dabo, Scientific Director, Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research in Tropical Medicine (KCCR), hosted David Obadina and Will Secor, both undergraduate students at Northeastern University. During their six-month visit, David and Will studied the biology of parasites common to Ghana, in particular the characterization of household midges in Buruli ulcer patients and PCR of common pathogens in children with fever, respectively.

 

David and Will were selected and recommended for this experience by Dr. Richard Wamai, Assistant Professor, African American Studies, and Dr. Michael Pollastri, Associate Professor, Medicinal Chemistry and Chemical Technology. Click here to read about David's experience and here to read about Will's experience in Ghana.
 


 

 *known as Merck in the US and Canada
spotlightNew Member Announcement


We are pleased to announce that the Icahn School of Medicine, Mount Sinai and the Guangzhou Institutes of Biomedicine and Health (GIBH), Chinese Academy of Sciences, have joined WIPO Re:Search.




Located in Guangzhou, China, the GIBH is home to the Center for Infection & Immunity, which consists of five labs: Pathogen Biology Lab, Immunological Biology Lab, Viral Immunology Lab, Vaccine and Biological Pharmaceuticals Lab, and Bacteriology Lab. Researchers within the Center study the interaction between infectious agents, host-pathogen interactions, malaria and helminth immunology, and the development of high-affinity T cell receptors (HATs) to treat viral infections.




Chartered in 1963, the Icahn School of Medicine, Mount Sinai is home to the Arnhold Global Health Institute, a new, institution-wide interdisciplinary program. Research at the Institute includes the study of host-pathogen interactions of RNA viruses, including dengue. The Experimental Therapeutics Institute (ETI) leverages the insights made by other researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine to develop novel drugs. Small-molecule drug discovery, therapeutic antibodies, and structure-based drug design are some of the core capabilities of the ETI.
hubPartnership Hub Central

Jennifer Dent attended the International Scientific Conference on Neglected Tropical Diseases: Female Genital Schistosomiasis and its Impact on HIV/AIDS that was organized by Merck KGaA. During the meeting Jennifer met with a number of scientists from Merck KGaA as well as researchers from across the African continent who are focused on schistosomiasis research and product development. She also interacted with policy leaders working to strengthen health care systems across Africa.
Conference Participants
spotMember Spotlight


The Council on Health Research for Development (COHRED) will be hosting its Global Forum on Research and Innovation for Health 2015 in Manila, Philippines. The Forum will promote the role of research and innovation in improving health while encouraging representatives from low- and middle-income countries to participate in defining the post-Millennium Development Goals global health research agenda. For more information, click here.
HCHighlighted Contributions  
 

Featured this month are two contributions submitted by Novartis to the WIPO Re:Search Database.


 


 

Novartis-GNF Anaerobic Mycobacterium tuberculosis dataset (ID: 1862)

Growing evidence suggest that the presence of a subpopulation of hypoxic, non-replicating, phenotypically drug resistant mycobacteria is responsible for the need for lengthy anti-tuberculosis treatment. Respiratory functions were demonstrated to be a weakness of these bacteria. Here we describe the development of a hypoxic model optimized to identify compounds targeting the mycobacterial respiratory functions and ATP homeostasis in a whole-cell screen. The model was adapted to a 1536-well plate format and successfully used to screen over 600,000 compounds. Nine hundred compounds were confirmed to reduce intracellular ATP level in a dose-dependent manner. The screen also identified 155 non-cytotoxic scaffolds with anaerobic activity against hypoxic, non-replicating M. tuberculosis. These ATP homeostasis disruptors are valuable to the understanding of the biology of persistent mycobacteria.
 


 

For more information or to discuss potential collaborations regarding this technology, please contact Roopa Ramamoorthi or Ujwal Sheth.  
newsWIPO Re:Search in the News


 

Intellectual Property Watch interviewed Tom Bombelles and Anatole Krattiger, WIPO, about WIPO Re:Search and its future prospects. Click here to access the article.


 

In a recent interview with Christiane Amanpour, Bill Gates gave credit to WIPO Re:Search Founding Members, Pfizer and GlaxoSmithKline, for bringing vaccine prices down and paving the way to reduced child deaths. Click here for more.
EventsTableUpcoming Global Health Events

Dates
Event Title
Location
Web Link
Mar. 8-13
Gordon Research Conference - Tropical Infectious Diseases: Challenges, Opportunities and Successes
Galveston, TX
Mar. 22-25
4th Conference on Protein Kinases of Parasitic Protozoa: Targeting Signaling Pathways in Parasites
Haifa, Israel
Apr. 16-18
British Society for Parasitology Spring Meeting 2015
Liverpool, UK

Are you attending a global health event?
Do you have a Research Request to highlight in the Snapshot?

We want to hear from you! Please send feedback and suggestions via email.
WIPO Re:Search Pharmaceutical Members


*known as EMD in the US and Canada
**known as Merck in the US and Canada

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