BioFocus and MMV to collaborate on malaria drugs

Collaboration

BioFocus DPI, the drug discovery services arm of Galapagos NV, is to collaborate with the Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV) to identify natural products and small molecules with anti-malarial activity.

Prior to agreeing the collaboration, MMV had access to BioFocus’s compound collections, which gave hits with anti-malarial activity in disease-specific assays. The aim of the current project is to determine which of the small molecules in these collections show activity, and to further optimise these hits.

“We are pleased that our [...] collections have yielded hits showing anti-malarial activity in multiple infected erythrocyte assays. These results show how well our libraries are suited for finding new leads in infectious disease,” said Chris Newton, Senior VP of BioFocus DPI.

“Screening of BioFocus DPI’s compound collections has generated many potential anti-malarial product leads of high quality. This is an exciting find, as MMV is proactively seeking for its portfolio new anti-malarial compounds that can be developed into effective medicines to not only treat the lethal falciparum malaria, but also tackle artemisinin resistance, stop malaria transmission and treat the rarer plasmodium vivax malaria,” said Tim Wells, Chief Scientific Officer MMV.