BioWorld International Correspondent

PARIS - The recently merged French pharmaceutical group bioMérieux-Pierre Fabre, which counts the Strasbourg-based gene therapy company Transgene among its subsidiaries, has concluded a research contract with Celera Genomics for acquiring genetic information to help develop improved anticancer drugs.

Utilizing data derived from patients who participated in earlier clinical trials conducted by Pierre Fabre, Celera is to study the polymorphisms of the genes of the "tubuline" (the basic skeleton of the cell), which is the therapeutic target of many anticancer drugs, including Fabre's Navelbine. The aim is to gain a better understanding of the role played by these genes in the efficacy and tolerance of drugs used to treat breast cancer.

The genetic profiles, or single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), produced by Celera, of Rockville, Md., will be used by bioMérieux to develop new therapeutic and molecular diagnosis strategies. The information will enable it to identify the genetic profile of those patients who can tolerate and effectively benefit from an anticancer therapy, opening the way to individualized treatment strategies tailored to the patient. According to the French company, this agreement is the first illustration of its strategy of "combining diagnostics and therapeutics to develop treatments that are better adapted to the profile of each patient."

A spokesperson for bioMérieux-Pierre Fabre told BioWorld International that there was no fixed term to the collaboration and that its effective duration was tied to the successive phases of clinical evaluation of the compounds resulting from it.