Aureus Pharma will participate in a consortium along with a number of industrial and academic research teams in a European Commission funded project entitled 'preDiCT: Computational Prediction of Drug Cardiac Toxicity'.
The goal of the three-year preDiCT project is to develop models to predict the effects of drugs on the heart. This is an important mission as many potential drug candidates fail during drug development due to adverse cardiotox safety factors. Computer models for cardiotoxicity will not only help to prioritise, but also ultimately avoid costly laboratory experimentation.
Aureus' contribution to the project will be to use its expertise in Ion Channel/hERG knowledge databases and knowledge management to design, build and populate the platform required for storing the experimental data that will be used to build models as well as the framework for collecting the knowledge generated in the modeling studies.
'We are delighted to participate in this important scientific initiative driven by a prestigious partner University Of Oxford in the UK,' commented Jason Theodosiou, CEO of Aureus Pharma. 'Our AurSCOPE Ion Channel and hERG knowledge databases and Aureus' expertise in building knowledge management registration systems, provides a strong foundation to build upon for Aureus' contributions to this project.'
In addition to Aureus Pharma, other partners include F Hoffmann-LaRoche AG, Fujitsu Laboratories of Europe, GlaxoSmithkline Research and Development, Novartis Pharma AG, University of Szeged, Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, and the CRS4, Center for Advanced Studies Research and Development in Sardinia. The University of Oxford is the coordinator of the project.
The project is part of a larger European Commission linked to the Virtual Physiological Human Network of Excellence.