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The Boston Biomedical Research Institute (BBRI) is dedicated to basic biomedical research to promote the understanding, treatment and prevention of specific human diseases. The areas of investigation concern the structure and function of muscle proteins,
Center for Functional Genomics is a Rensselaer, NY-based company in the Healthcare, Pharmaceuticals, and Biotech sector.
Kadmon is a fully integrated biopharmaceutical company engaged in the discovery, development and commercialization of small molecules and biologics to address disease areas of significant unmet medical need. We are developing product candidates within autoimmune and fibrotic diseases, oncology and genetic diseases. We leverage our multi-disciplinary research and clinical development team members, who prior to joining Kadmon had brought more than 15 drugs to market, to identify and pursue a diverse portfolio of novel product candidates, both through in-licensing products and employing our small molecule and biologics platforms. We utilize our advanced understanding of the molecular mechanisms of disease to establish development paths for disease areas where significant unmet medical needs exist.
Yumanity Therapeutics is transforming drug discovery for neurodegenerative diseases caused by protein misfolding. Despite the fact that an estimated 50 million people worldwide suffer from diseases affecting the brain and central nervous system, there are no approved disease-modifying therapies or cures. Yumanity is working to identify and develop new, disease-modifying therapies that address several illnesses with critical unmet medical needs, including Alzheimer`s disease, Parkinson`s disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The company`s approach concentrates on correcting the cellular pathologies driven by misfolded proteins, the altered biology or phenotypes driving these diseases. Yumanity Therapeutics was founded in December 2014 by Susan Lindquist, Ph.D., award-winning protein folding expert, and Tony Coles, M.D., a renowned biotech industry leader. The company`s proprietary platforms have already identified one potential new target for treating Parkinson`s disease, and Yumanity is actively advancing its new chemical lead series for this condition, as well as identifying additional compounds for Alzheimer`s disease and ALS. Targeting the underlying protein pathology of neurodegenerative diseases allows the company to discover therapies that may modify the root cause of these rather than only addressing their symptoms.
Type 1 diabetes (T1D), formerly known as juvenile diabetes, is a chronic, life-threatening disease that affects millions of people worldwide. In the United States, 30,000 new cases are estimated every year with half of those cases diagnosed in young children. Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease in which the patient`s immune system goes awry and attacks and destroys the pancreatic beta cells. Beta cells are responsible for regulating blood sugar (glucose) levels by producing precise amounts of the essential hormone insulin. The discovery of injectable insulin in the 1920s changed T1D from a uniformly fatal disease with a life expectancy of months to one that could be carefully managed for decades through multiple daily blood glucose measurements and insulin injections. However, insulin injections are not a cure and patients face a lifetime of difficult disease management and serious complications including kidney failure, blindness and nerve damage. Despite nearly a century passing since the discovery of insulin, insulin injection remains the only treatment available to patients. Semma Therapeutics was founded to develop transformative therapies for patients who currently depend on insulin injections. Recent work in the laboratory of Professor Douglas Melton led to the discovery of a method to generate billions of functional, insulin-producing beta cells in the laboratory. These cells develop in islet-like clusters grown from stem cells. Initial preclinical work in animal models of diabetes has shown that transplantation of these cells are sufficient to control blood glucose levels. This breakthrough technology has been exclusively licensed to Semma Therapeutics for the development of a cell-based therapy for diabetes. Ongoing research at Semma Therapeutics is focused on combining these proprietary cells with a state-of-the-art cell delivery and immune protection strategy that can protect these cells from the patient`s immune system and allow the beta cells to function as they do in non-diabetic individuals. Implantation of the beta cell-filled device has the potential to provide a true replacement for the missing beta cells in a diabetic patient and would not require patient immunosuppression. Semma Therapeutics is working to bring this new therapeutic option to the clinic and improve the lives of patients with diabetes.