The Neuro (Montreal Neurological Institute-Hospital) is one of only three non-EU associated partners in a newly formed consortium 鈥淓nabling and Unlocking biology in the OPEN鈥� (EUbOPEN), focused on generating open-access chemical tools to unlock disease biology, with a total budget of 66 million euros.
One of the most powerful and versatile ways for scientists to better understand biology and disease processes is the use of small chemical tools to study proteins as specifically as possible, avoiding unintended effects on other proteins. Ideally, such tools would be available for every human protein.
EUbOPEN aims to develop and disseminate high quality chemical tool compounds for 1,000 proteins (one third of the druggable proteins in the human body), urgently needed for basic and applied research. These research tools will be openly available without restrictions, empowering academia and industry to explore disease biology and unlock the discovery of new drug targets and treatments.
The Neuro, the world鈥檚 first Open Science institution, will be testing compounds in the lab of Dr. Edward Fon and at The Neuro鈥檚 Open Early Drug Discovery Platform (EDDU), which leverages breakthroughs in stem cell technology to build a suite of industry-standard assays and discover new patient-centric therapies. The collaboration will see an exchange of tools, protocols and expertise between The Neuro and EU members.
鈥淭he unique and exciting aspect of the EDDU platform is that we are creating the most specific cells for studying disease using a patient鈥檚 own tissue, which has distinct advantages over using generic cells or animal models鈥� Dr. Fon, Scientific Director. 鈥淭esting the chemical tools developed through EUbOPEN in a patient鈥檚 very own cells may hold the key to new treatments and even cures for devastating neurological diseases.鈥�
EUbOPEN will develop compounds using new technologies and test them in well-characterized, disease-relevant human tissue assays in the areas of immunology, oncology and neuroscience. The project outputs, including chemogenomic library sets, chemical probes, assay protocols and associated research data will be made openly available to the research community without restriction.
The EUbOPEN consortium comprises 22 different partner organizations, including universities, research institutes, European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations members, and small and medium-sized enterprise. Goethe University Frankfurt and Boehringer Ingelheim are jointly leading EUbOPEN and announced the consortium on June 8.
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