Collaborative Efforts Deepen Understanding in Alzheimer's Research
ACD/Labs collaborates with leading Alzheimer's research scientist Dr. Gilbert Rishton to evaluate CNS drugs, and offer a deeper understanding of the parameters that effect blood brain barrier permeability.
Toronto, Canada (March 12, 2007)—
Since its inception in 1994, Advanced Chemistry Development, Inc., (ACD/Labs) has maintained a tradition of open collaboration with researchers in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, as well as non-profit organizations and academic institutions. These collaborations have resulted in progress towards solutions to some very complex chemical issues.
One such issue involves the development of drugs to treat Alzheimer's disease, specifically the ability to predict the permeability of compounds through the blood-brain barrier for action within the central nervous system. Researchers at ACD/Labs collaborated with leading Alzheimer's disease researcher Dr. Gilbert Rishton, founder and director of the Channel Islands Alzheimer's Institute at California State University, to study and refine in-silico techniques for the prediction of blood-brain barrier permeability. Using ACD/Labs' software tools to predict logP and other molecular physical properties thought to influence blood-brain barrier (BBB) permeability, a comparative study of several known central nervous system drugs versus new secretase inhibitors was conducted. Results of this research were published in Current Opinions in Drug Discovery & Development, September, 2006.
"Alzheimer's disease and neurodegeneration in general remains one of the most urgent unmet medical needs of our time.' said Dr Gilbert Rishton, Director, Channel Islands Alzheimer's Institute. "The ACD/Labs blood-brain barrier tool provides medicinal chemists with the ability to rapidly assess the potential of small molecule CNS drug leads to reach their molecular targets in the brain. It is an easy, rapid, and predictive tool for any discovery program where brain exposure is a requirement or, in some cases, a liability."
Over the years, ACD/Labs has formed many collaborative relationships with prominent researchers and organizations. Among their partners are Chemical Abstract Service (CAS)—who provide ACD/Labs' physicochemical property values to subscribers of their online research discovery tool, SciFinder; GlaxoSmithKline—with whom pKa predictors were refined with in-house experimental data, and further development work continues to provide pharmaceutically relevant solutions; and many academic institutions worldwide. The company's goal is to continue to form these relationships in order to provide useful and innovative software solutions to the research community, and, in turn, gain valuable feedback upon which to improve and develop new technologies.
For information about ACD/LogP and other physicochemical prediction tools, visit our website
www.acdlabs.com
About Advanced Chemistry Development
Advanced Chemistry Development, Inc., (ACD/Labs) is a chemistry software company offering solutions that truly integrate chemical structures with analytical chemistry information. ACD/Labs creates innovative software packages that aid chemical research scientists worldwide with spectroscopic validation of structures, elucidation of unknown substances, chromatographic separation, medicinal chemistry, preformulation of novel drug agents, and chemical patenting and publication. Combined, ACD/Labs solutions create an analytical informatics system that provides dramatic feed-forward effects on the chemical research process. Founded in 1994, and headquartered in Toronto, Canada, ACD/Labs employs a team of over 145 dedicated individuals whose continual efforts carry ACD/Labs innovative technologies into pharmaceutical, biotech, chemical, and materials companies throughout the world. Information about Advanced Chemistry Development and its products can be found at www.acdlabs.com.
About The Channel Islands Alzheimer's Institute
The Channel Islands Alzheimer's Institute was established on the campus of CSUCI to enable chemists and biologists to collaborate and discover mechanism-based small molecule drug leads for Alzheimer's disease. Our focus is on the inhibition of neurodegeneration via amyloidogenic pathways, and on the stimulation of neurogenesis via the differentiation of adult neural stem cells to form new neurons. This work is done with an emphasis on new product development with an aim to partner with pharma groups in an effort to accelerate drug development and to address this most important unmet medical need.
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