FAITh
Financiado
Fighting Anxiety with Importin based Therapeutics
Anxiety and stress-related conditions represent a significant health burden in modern society. Anxiety disorders are currently treated with a variety of agents targeting synaptic mechanisms. These agents either directly affect neu...
Anxiety and stress-related conditions represent a significant health burden in modern society. Anxiety disorders are currently treated with a variety of agents targeting synaptic mechanisms. These agents either directly affect neurotransmitter receptor systems or modulate neurotransmitter levels or availability, but their long-term use is limited by problematic side effects and suboptimal efficacy. The development of new anxiolytic drugs has been fraught with difficulty, hence there is a need for new targets and new avenues for therapeutic development.
Importin-dependent transport mechanisms link synapse to nucleus in a diversity of physiological contexts, rendering them potentially interesting targets for behavioural control. However importins and related molecules have not been evaluated for roles in anxiolysis to date. We discovered the roles of importins in axonal injury signaling and in cell size sensing. During the course of our current ERC Advanced grant, and as part of one of the aims, we have conducted comprehensive phenotyping of importin mouse mutants to identify in vivo consequences of the deregulation of size control pathways. One importin mutant line presented a specific phenotype in anxiety tests, and follow-up analyses identified a new molecular pathway for anxiety regulation, and approved drugs affecting this pathway that can be repositioned for anxiety treatment.
In this PoC, we will (1) carry out IP protection on our initial identifications of anxiolytic drugs; (2) further validate the anxiolytic activities of these drugs and their closely related structural or functional analogs; and (3) devise an HTS-compatible assay for targeting the importin involved and conduct a pilot screen of ~200,000 compounds in this assay to identify new drug leads for anxiety treatment. As a final step, we will carry out (4) additional IP protection and pre-commercialisation tasks for maximizing the commercialisation potential of our discovery.
ver más
Duración del proyecto: 18 meses
Fecha Inicio: 2017-10-02
Fecha Fin: 2019-04-30
Fecha Fin: 2019-04-30
Línea de financiación: concedida
El organismo H2020 notifico la concesión del proyecto el día 2019-04-30
Línea de financiación objetivo
El proyecto se financió a través de la siguiente ayuda:
ERC-2017-PoC:
ERC-Proof of Concept
Cerrada
hace 7 años
Presupuesto
El presupuesto total del proyecto asciende a
150K€
Líder del proyecto
WEIZMANN INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE
No se ha especificado una descripción o un objeto social para esta compañía.
Perfil tecnológico
TRL
4-5
Perfil tecnológico
TRL
4-5
363.02K€ |
Participante