BioForce joins forces down under to seek out breast cancer
BioForce has signed a two-year joint venture with Australian Cancer Technologies (AustCancer) to discover novel cancer therapeutics for breast cancer.
The collaboration will involve using BioFocus' Retroviral Display assay system that can be used to detect compounds that modulate receptor tyrosine kinases, which have been implicated in breast cancer. If these compounds can be identified, then these compounds could have the potential to be developed and evaluated by AustCancer.
Retroviral Display is a technology acquired by BioForce from Cambridge Drug Discovery. BioFocus' library of over 100,000 compounds will be screened to identify potential compounds that change receptor function and halt the growth of rapidly dividing cells.
AustCancer will fund the joint venture and BioForce will contribute technology and scientific expertise. The evaluation will be carried out through AustCancer's existing collaboration with St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney, Australia.
Dr David Stone, chief executive of BioFocus, said, 'The collaboration will continue to build on BioFocus' expanding market presence in the Asia-Pacific Rim and also allow us to capitalise on AustCancer's experienced clinical team in developing novel therapeutics for breast cancer.'
Dr Alistair Cowden, md AustCancer, added, 'This alliance will jointly support a screening and development venture capitalising on the robotic screening systems and drug library available at BioForce and broadens the company's network of collaborations.'