DMMC/Wyeth Course MOLECULES TO MEDICINES: HOW BIOPHARMA DELIVERS

1040-1230 Tuesday 30 October 2007.
Durkan Lecture Theatre, Institute of Molecular Medicine, TCD, St James's Hospital

DISCOVERY
1040-1125 Introduction to the business of discovering biopharmaceuticals
1145-1230 Current biopharmaceutical product candidates and a look into next generation technologies
Dr Davinder Gill (Senior Director, Biologic Therapeutics, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals)

The Biotech industry was launched in 1982 when the US Food and Drug Administration approved Humulin, a recombinant form of human insulin genetically-engineered to be produced in E. coli. From humble beginnings less than 25 years ago, the Biotech industry has expanded steadily over the years with over 80 recombinant DNA products approved by the FDA to date. Today, the collection of Biotech products includes secreted factors, fusion proteins, monoclonal antibodies and other products.

The Pharmaceutical industry, working in close collaboration with academic institutions, research organizations and medical centers, has developed advanced tools and technologies to enable Biotech drug discovery. These technologies involve molecular and cellular biology techniques, protein structure/function technologies, protein engineering, in vitro assays and animal models. This session will describe how the Pharmaceutical industry adapts such diverse tools to the discovery of biotech drugs, how projects are shepherded through the complexity of pharmaceutical product development, how scientific innovation and creativity are utilized and how the risk of drug discovery is spread over multi-pronged strategies.

Suggested Reading

Walsh, G. (2003). Biopharmaceutical benchmarks – 2003. Nat. Biotechnol. 21, 865-870. PubMed Entry

Gill, D.S. and Damle, N.K. (2006). Biopharmaceutical drug discovery using novel protein scaffolds. Curr Opin Biotechnol. 6, 653-658. PubMed Entry