A Seattle-based biotechnology company has received a new round of federal funding that will allow it to develop an in vitro testing system that mimics the human blood-brain barrier.
Nortis Inc. was awarded a $688,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health. The money will fund the third year of a Small Business Innovation Research fast-track grant from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.
Kevin Banks, PhD, Nortis’ vice president of sales and marketing, told MD Magazine that the technology dovetails nicely with efforts by drug developers to reduce animal testing and lower the rate of clinical trial failures. Banks noted that about 4 of every 10 Phase III studies are failures, a ratio that translates to expensive losses for drug companies.
“This is primarily due to efficacy and safety failures of the drugs, which have been primarily tested to that point using animal models and not human models,” Banks said. “The vision of using human 3D tissue models is to reduce clinical trial failure rates by using more relevant human models early in the drug development process.”
Drug delivery to the brain has long been a challenge for pharmaceutical companies. The blood-brain barrier, which is composed of endothelial tissue, protects the brain from foreign substances and helps maintain a constant environment, but the barrier also can stop drug molecules from getting into the brain.
Thus, companies developing drugs that require entry into the brain to trigger the desired pharmacological response have a major interest in efficiently and reliably figuring out how their therapies hold up against the barrier.
