NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Opko Health said today that it has expanded a collaboration with Bristol-Myers Squibb to include biomarker discovery for pharmacogenomic tests for use in treating Alzheimer's disease.
The Miami-based diagnostics and biopharmaceutical firm said that the deal builds on an earlier partnership aimed at studying the utility of Opko's Alzheimer's diagnostic technologies to now include efforts to identify biomarkers that can predict blood response in several therapeutic areas.
Under the earlier, multi-year collaboration, Opko and BMS have been studying the potential of using Opko's platform for both diagnosing Alzheimer's disease and for identifying individuals with early-stage impairment who may progress to Alzheimer's.
The company's molecular diagnostics platform, which was developed by Scripps Research Institute Professor Thomas Kodadek, uses synthetic molecules called peptoids to screen for autoantibodies in blood that are associated with Alzheimer's disease.