Cenix BioScience and collaborators awarded major research grant from German National Genome Research Network (NGFN) for development of anti-malarial agents.
 

Dresden, Germany, April 2, 2008  - Cenix BioScience GmbH today announced that it, together with two academic collaborators, has secured a major research grant under the German National Genome Research Network's "NGFN-Transfer" initiative, financed by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).

The 3-year grant totaling 1,072,000 Euro will help support a collaborative project entitled "A platform for the development of prophylactic anti-malarial agents" between Cenix and its long-time malaria partner, Dr. Maria Mota at the Instituto Medicine Molecular (IMM in Lisbon, Portugal) and new collaborators Dr. Kai Matuschewski at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology (MPI-IB, Berlin) and Dr. Friedrich Frischknecht at the University of Heidelberg, Germany. The work will include lead optimization of anti-malarial compounds previously identified by Cenix and Dr. Mota, as well as screens for new target genes and compounds followed by pre-clinical testing of lead candidates, with a view towards developing novel anti-malarial treatments.