What's Happening?
Tessel Biosciences, a company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has been awarded up to $4.2 million through the ARPA-H CATALYST program. This funding is part of a contract awarded to the PREDICTS consortium, which includes Tessel Biosciences, Deep Origin, Ginkgo Bioworks, Netrias, and MIDO, with product sponsors ImmVue and Sanford Burnham Prebys. Tessel specializes in creating virtual tissues that simulate drug effects on human patient-derived cells, aiming to predict clinical outcomes without relying on animal testing. The company will use the grant to develop and scale up human tissue models of the gut, kidney, and blood-brain barrier, which are crucial for understanding drug movement through these boundaries. The data generated will support
computational modeling of small molecule ADMET properties and will be made publicly available to advance research in the field.
Why It's Important?
The funding from ARPA-H represents a significant step forward in the field of drug development, particularly in enhancing the safety and efficacy of new therapeutics. By using virtual tissues to simulate human biology, Tessel Biosciences aims to reduce the reliance on animal testing, which has ethical and scientific limitations. This approach not only accelerates the drug development process but also improves the accuracy of predicting how drugs will behave in humans. The initiative aligns with broader industry trends towards New Approach Methodologies (NAMs) that prioritize human-relevant data. The success of this project could lead to more effective and safer drugs, benefiting patients and healthcare systems by reducing the time and cost associated with bringing new drugs to market.
What's Next?
Tessel Biosciences will focus on scaling up its virtual tissue models and integrating them into the PREDICTS consortium's efforts. The data generated from these models will be crucial for developing computational tools that predict drug behavior across different human tissues. As the project progresses, it is expected that the findings will be shared with the broader scientific community, potentially influencing regulatory policies and industry standards for drug testing. The collaboration with other consortium members will also foster innovation and cross-disciplinary research, potentially leading to new breakthroughs in drug safety and efficacy.
