(ANSA) – TRENTO, 09 OCT – The University of Trento has obtained an investment for the development of an innovative platform dedicated to the treatment of a large family of rare diseases.
The investment comes from Extend, the national technology transfer hub dedicated to biopharma created on the initiative of Cdp Venture Capital in collaboration with Evotec and Angelini Ventures.
This project – the University of Trento informs in a note – represents an important step in the field of advanced therapies, with the aim of providing new therapeutic solutions for pathological conditions that currently have few or no treatment options available. The research is conducted by Alessandro Quattrone, professor at the Department of Cellular, Computational and Integrative Biology (Cibio) of the University of Trento, with his group which includes Maria Corinna Diener, Samuele Sanniti and Alberto Raoss.
“For the past five years we have worked to circumvent one of the main limitations of gene editing: the need to develop therapeutic strategies tailored to disease-specific mutations. Our innovative approach exploits a universal principle to increase cellular manufacturing of proteins, Offering a potential solution for over 400 rare diseases caused by protein insufficiency, together with talented young people in my group, we are now ready to exploit the full potential of this strategy. Extend provides the perfect platform to bring this vision to life.” , declares Quattrone.
The project is called Kozaks, an acronym for “Kinetic Optimization of Zygosity by Altered Kozak Sequence”, but also an evocative name that refers to the biochemist Marilyn Kozak, known for having discovered over 40 years ago precisely the genetic sequence that regulates efficient protein production.
The project is not at year zero. “We have already come out with a scientific article, created with the essential contribution of one of our good doctoral students, now elsewhere (Chiara Ambrosini), and we have filed a patent, but this funding allows us to move from the preclinical phase to the industrial project”, he concludes Quattrone. (HANDLE).