Isis: Target for obesity researchers

Licensing opportunity

Oxford University’s technology transfer company, Isis Innovation, has launched range of new assays for obesity research – tools that can be used to identify potential drug candidates. A team led by Oxford’s Professor Chris Schofield has developed the assays. They are based on the group’s pioneering work which identified a gene and an enzyme strongly implicated in obesity.

Isis Innovation has applied for a patent on the work and it is now available for commercial use via licence. Isis will also set up consultancy agreements with Schofield’s group.

“The FTO gene was the first gene to be identified which is both common, and a strong factor in increased weight,” said Schofield. “The fact that we’ve been able to show that FTO is an enzyme, and have developed assays which will tell us if a drug candidate is targeting that enzyme, opens up the potential of FTO as a ‘druggable target’, and – we hope – ultimately to a new method for treating obesity.”

Previously, researchers had determined that people with two copies of the “fat” FTO gene have a 70 per cent higher risk of obesity than those with none, and weigh 3 kilograms  more. People carrying one copy of the FTO gene had a 30 per cent higher risk of being obese compared to a person with no copies of the gene.

The FTO protein belongs to a family of enzymes known as oxygenases, which are involved in cellular processes including DNA repair, fatty acid metabolism and post-translational modifications.

Schofield said that the assays could be used by pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies interested in altering FTO activity in a new approach to controlling obesity.