Scripps Research Translational Institute & Drug Discovery Affiliate Calibr Invite Proposals for Collaborative Drug Repurposing Screens
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11 Jul Scripps Research Translational Institute & Drug Discovery Affiliate Calibr Invite Proposals for Collaborative Drug Repurposing Screens
The Scripps Research Translational Institute and drug discovery affiliate Calibr invite proposals for collaborative drug repurposing screens. This translational endeavor aims to partner clinical proficiencies throughout the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) network with drug discovery resources. CTSA-affiliated researchers and clinicians who have identified potential drug targets, pathways or screening approaches and are interested in accelerated translation into patients through drug repurposing are encouraged to respond.
Purpose
Working closely with Calibr scientists to develop an innovative assay or idea, investigators will have an opportunity to screen a best-in-class drug repurposing collection containing nearly all small molecules in any phase of clinical development. The program will give CTSA investigators access to small molecule screening capabilities and associated support, including assay optimization and miniaturization, hit identification and triaging, hit characterization, medicinal chemistry and in vivo pharmacology. Seeking synergy, a clear ability to execute on potential direct repurposing opportunities will be a key factor in selecting collaborative screens, in addition to innovation, enablement, and impact.
About ReFRAME
Repurposing, Focused Rescue, and Accelerated Medchem (ReFRAME) is a screen-ready collection of approximately 12,000 clinical compounds created with financial support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. This unique drug repurposing library contains not only FDA-approved drugs, but also investigational new drugs (INDs) that are or were in any phase of clinical development, including >1000 non-commercially available compounds with undisclosed structures manually determined using broad competitive intelligence resources. The scale and comprehensiveness of ReFRAME – the first collection built by systematically querying all available clinical data and obtaining compounds through purchase (~57%) or resynthesis (~43%) without regard to mechanism of action, availability, patent status or cost – represent a far greater reach than typical FDA-approved drug libraries.
Calibr’s prior success employing collaborative ReFRAME screens highlights how enabling a unique resource like ReFRAME can be for the non-profit scientific community. For example, a partnership focused on infectious and neglected disease recently supported more than a dozen ReFRAME screens in leading academic labs around the world, fostering strong new inter-institutional partnerships and resulting in the discovery of multiple promising repurposed drug candidates, including candidates for tuberculosis and diarrheal diseases currently being evaluated in clinical trials. With support from the CTSA, Calibr and Scripps Research Translational Institute now aim to expand the model by making ReFRAME and Calibr’s translational expertise accessible to the broader CTSA network.
NIH Funding Acknowledgment:Important Reminder – Please acknowledge the NIH when publishing papers, patents, projects, and presentations resulting from the use of CTSI resources by including the NIH Funding Acknowledgement.
