Partnership targets proteins to design new drugs
Phylos, Inc. is partnering with the Laboratory to develop high throughput
methods for protein production to create research reagents and microarrays
that may be used to design new drugs or disease diagnostic tools.
Under the terms of this collaboration, a team of LLNL scientists led by
senior biomedical scientist Joanna Albala, will work closely with Phylos
to develop automated methods for the expression and production of cellular
proteins. In addition, the partnership provides Phylos broad access to
the full-length cDNA collection of the LLNL-maintained IMAGE (Integrated
Molecular Analysis of Genomes and their Expression) Consortium, which
will be used for the expression of recombinant proteins. Founded in 1993,
the IMAGE Consortium is a worldwide effort to array, map and sequence
all human genes as well as those of other species, such as mouse, and
provide the clones and sequence information into the public domain.
"LLNL’s expertise at miniaturization and automation, coupled
with Joanna Albala’s enthusiastic approach to apply this methodology
to protein production, significantly advances Phylos’ ability to
generate complex target proteins," said Richard Wagner, senior vice
president of Research at Phylos. "Phylos will use these target proteins
for our own internal efforts, and to service our collaborators using our
high throughput, custom-binding proteins for research reagent and microarray
applications."
" I am honored to have the opportunity to work with Phylos and we
at LLNL are eager to embark into this partnership," Albala said.
"The capabilities that Phylos has developed are very exciting and
will certainly make valuable contributions to our efforts, as well as
the growing field of proteomics and protein microarray technology."
Phylos has developed a broad enabling technology in combinatorial biology
which it describes as mRNA display, otherwise known as Phylos’ PROfusion
technology. This technology, a cornerstone of Phylos’ platform in
directed protein evolution, is based on the use of libraries of covalently
linked nucleic acid-protein molecules. PROfusion technology enables the
rapid selection of specific proteins with desired properties. Once proteins
are selected, their population can be significantly enriched by PCR-amplification
of the genetic tag that is attached to each protein. Strict control of
the selection conditions, together with sequential rounds of selection
and amplification, allow Phylos scientists to develop proteins that possess
specific characteristics of interest, such as high affinity and specificity.
Phylos uses its PROfusion technology to produce and identify high affinity,
target-specific binding proteins. The immediate focus of the company is
to produce large numbers of binding proteins, based on its proprietary
TRINECTIN protein framework, to allow the assembly of high-throughput
protein profiling platforms, such as microarrays. In addition, the company
is utilizing the technology to identify and validate new therapeutic targets,
as well as to create new biotherapeutic molecules.