Evotec: patient biobank access to advance drug discovery

25-Jun-2017 - Last updated on 26-Jun-2017 at 16:17 GMT

The NURTuRE consortium will initially focus on chronic kidney disease and nephrotic syndrome patients. (Image: iStock/Natali_Mis)

Evotec has joined a consortium through which it gains access to a sample biobank in order to perform drug discovery based on unique kidney disease patient cohorts.

The National Unified Renal Translational Research Enterprise (NURTuRE) consortium is made up of UK-based academic institutions coordinated by Kidney Research UK and various industry partners.

NURTuRE is collecting clinical data at the UK Renal Registry and analyzing samples from 14 kidney disease centers across the UK over a five-year period. Through the consortium, researchers will be able to apply for access to patient samples, including kidney biopsies, blood, serum, and urine, which will be stored in the biobank for histological and molecular analysis to identify and validate targets and biomarkers.

Dr. Cord Dohrmann, CSO of Evotec told us the consortium gives the company access to patient data and samples “on the basis of fully established high-quality processes and databases.”

Protocols for sampling and analysis have been optimized to industry standard, he added.

Additionally, Dohman said the joint effort of academic experts and industry partners enables a comprehensive and unique core data analysis, which will be the basis for success of Evotec programs arising from NURTuRE data sets, he explained.

Evotec will expand and merge other R&D activities in the kidney disease field into NURTuRE, Dohrmann said, adding that this will bring “additional validation and accelerate the speed of these projects.”

The biobank is funded by AbbVie Inc, Evotec, UCB Celltech Biopharma, and Kidney Research UK.