NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Wisconsin biotech firm Lucigen said on Monday it has received a $226,401 Small Business Innovation Research Phase I grant from the National Institutes of Health to develop genomic tools for use in discovering and characterizing new therapeutics from fungi.
Working with research partners from the University of Wisconsin, the company will identify compounds with potential antibiotic properties from the Aspergillus genus of fungi. The work will seek to discover biological compounds previously unknown to scientists and build a library of novel small molecules that will be studied for therapeutic applications, Lucigen said.
According to the firm, based in Middleton, Wis., the development of antibiotics has reached a level not seen since the 1940s as increasing numbers of bacteria become resistant to currently available drugs.
Lucigen develops products and technologies for gene cloning, genomics, and protein expression.