NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – The Danish drug discovery firm Nuevolution said today that it will collaborate with Cancer Research Technology, the commercial branch of Cancer Research UK, to identify possible drug candidates for use in cancer treatments.
Under the collaboration, Nuevolution will use its Chemetics technology, which uses DNA labeling for small-molecule drug screening, to identify drug leads that block the activity of a number of cancer targets, the company said.
CRT will harness CRUK's cancer research network to provide biological information about the targets on which the partners plan to focus their efforts. CRT also will provide expertise in in vitro screening assays, cellular activity assays, and other drug discovery activities.
Any further pre-clinical development of promising small molecules the partners identify will be worked out under a separate agreement between Nuevolution and CRT, the company said.
Hamish Ryder, CRT's director of drug discovery for its Discovery Laboratories, said in a statement that the collaboration "will allow us to address a number of 'low-tractability' cancer targets" that have made cancer drug discovery difficult, and will enable them to assess hundreds of millions of potential compounds.