12 December 2006

Singapore’s award-winning biomedical sciences research group, the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology (IMCB), and New Zealand technology company Industrial Research Limited (IRL) have signed a groundbreaking agreement to collaborate on stem cell research into the healing of bones.

IRL is a New Zealand-based technology company based on world-class science and engineering capability. As well as its glycoactive and glycotherapeutic technologies and facilities, IRL has expertise in nutraceuticals, natural products’ processing and pharmaceutical development.

It also has other international research deals, such as with BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc in the United States for the development of drugs for the treatment of cancer and auto-immune diseases.

Stem cell therapies are seen as the next major leap in the biotechnology race to cure human disease.

By using complex carbohydrate compounds, stem cells can be made to grow faster or mature into different cell types. Bone healing can be sped up by applying the right complex carbohydrates to trigger the bone stem cells to grow to regenerate the damaged or diseased tissue.

The IMCB-IRL agreement brings together IMCB’s world leadership in stem cells and IRL’s work on the characterisation of complex carbohydrates. IRL has one of the few chemistry teams in the world with the expertise to work in this field.

The agreement between the two organisations followed a visit to IRL’s head office in Wellington earlier this year by IMCB’s executive director Sir David Lane. During the visit he learned that these two small-molecule carbohydrate drugs developed by IRL and its partners were in human clinical trials.

“We hope that the agreement will drive our work at IMCB in this direction,” Sir David said, adding Singapore was keen to work with “its scientific neighbour”.

Under the agreement, IMCB will provide IRL with carbohydrate molecules, which have been identified as having effects on the pluripotent stem cells. IRL’s glycoactive and glycotherapeutic technologies and facilities will determine the carbohydrate structures to enable the synthesis of the molecules for preclinical research and applications.

By determining the structures, IRL’s role will include determining how to make the specific carbohydrates that trigger bone stem cells heal.

IRL will be working with IMCB’s Stem Cell and Tissue Repair Laboratory, which focuses on identifying, isolating and purifying carbohydrate molecules that have evident effects on stem cell growth and development.

IMCB was awarded the Nikkei Prize 2000 for Technological Innovation in recognition of its growth into a leading international research centre. It also recently led an international consortium that sequenced the entire pufferfish (Fugu) genome.

The agreement was brokered by Investment New Zealand, New Zealand’s national investment promotion agency – a specialist unit within New Zealand Trade and Enterprise (NZTE).

Chris Boalch, NZTE’s sector director biotechnology, said the IMCB-IRL agreement is further evidence that New Zealand’s biotech capabilities are world class and was a stepping stone towards further scientific collaboration between New Zealand and Singapore.

For more information, please contact:

heath.morrison@investmentnz.govt.nz

+64 9 915 4242