Welcome to the 2018 edition of Bicoll News. For those familiar with Bicoll’s previous yearly newsletters, we would like to introduce the good “new-old” style of a snapshot of topics concerning our last year that aims to provide an overview of our services and capabilities. We thank you, our loyal customers, partners and friends for your ongoing support and trust in Bicoll’s business.
2017 has been an interesting year for Bicoll. As challenge is a strong impulse for development, Bicoll has kept on expanding its innovation-driven drug discovery and medicinal chemistry R&D and service platform. 2017 has also been a year of successful introduction to many Asian life science partners for Bicoll. And not to forget our changing visual appearance is reflecting steady growth. The new company website tells you more about how we might be able to help you get ahead and stay ahead in drug discovery and medicinal chemistry projects.
We are looking forward to hearing from you and meeting you in 2018.
Yours sincerely,
Dr. Kai Lamottke, Managing Director
_______________________________________________________
TOPICS
- Successful preliminary results in European consortium project EpimiRNA
- Successful closure of the joint project of University Charité (EpicLeap)
- Fast start into a new taste modulating project SimLeap
- Ongoing cooperations supported by the German government
- What to expect from Bicoll in 2018 – extension of drug discovery cooperations on the Asian market, projected development of our analytical department and enlargement of medicinal chemistry team
_______________________________________________________
SUCCESSFUL PRELIMINARY RESULTS IN EUROPEAN CONSORTIUM PROJECT EPIMIRNA
Since 01.09.2013 Bicoll is the part of the EpimiRNA (epimirna.eu) consortium which includes 16 member from different (almost) European countries. The goal of the consortium supported though the 7th European Framework Programm (Horizon 2020) – MicroRNAs in the pathogenesis, treatment and prevention of epilepsy under an epileptogenic insult. Throughout the last 4 years the partners has achieved the promising results. The last update about the field were published in the Top-Journal Lancet Neurology “MicroRNAs in epilepsy: pathophysiology and clinical utility” (Authors: Henshall DC, Hamer HM, Pasterkamp RJ, Goldstein DB, Kjems J, Prehn JHM, Schorge S, Lamottke K, Rosenow F. The Lancet. Neurology. 2016 Dec;15(13):1368-1376).
The last 5th year of the consortium started on the 1st of September and has set the agenda as commercialization of the results and strategic approach to the potential clients which could use the microRNA and plant small molecules to bring it as an end product to the market.
_______________________________________________________
SUCCESSFUL CLOSURE OF THE JOINT PROJECT OF UNIVERSITY CHARITÉ (EPICLEAP)
In March 2017, EpicLeap (Anti-Epileptic Compounds Leveraging Ancient Prescription – Evaluation of the hand written medical records from China written inbetween 18th and 20th centuries for the development of the new, human antiepileptic compounds). The project was successfully closed after almost 2,5 years of work and development the databank out of 40.000 historical Chinese recepies gathered over the last 200 years all over the country in the different provinces.
Out of the project development and the pilot databank EpicLeap the cooperation project SimLeap start was possible on the 1st of August 2017.
_______________________________________________________
FAST START INTO A NEW TASTE MODULATING PROJECT SIMLEAP
SimLeap: Reformulation of low-calorie foods
Nutrition and lifestyle induce many diseases in industrialized countries. The basis for malnutrition is often laid early in childhood. Misguided taste impressions are caused for example by excessive consumption of foods with a high proportion of added sweet carbohydrates. Due to this, natural, sugar reduced and healthy products appear often tasteless or even too bitter. Research team expects to identify taste-enhancing ingredients out of the worldwide unique Asian plant diversity. The total project (Symrise, Charité and Bicoll) has a volume of € 1.6m (Federal Ministry of Education and Research part € 1.1m).
_______________________________________________________
ONGOING COOPERATIONS SUPPORTED BY THE GERMAN GOVERNMENT
In 2017 Bicoll has joined German-Japanese Cooperation for the Advancement of Biomedical Innovations. The InnoMuNiCH project aims to increase global innovations in the biopharmaceutical industry and pool together German and Japanese expertise in research and development. InnoMuNiCH stands for “Innovations through Munich-Nippon Cooperations in Healthcare”. The project has been funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) as part of the funding program “Internationalization of Leading-Edge Clusters, Forward-Looking Projects and Other, Comparable Networks” since January 2017. Throughout the year Bicoll got support and supported the network and joined in BioJapan 2017 and Osaka partnering event in October.
In 2017 Bicoll has joined the ImmPact project: ImmPact Bavaria is a cooperative network that links experts from the fields of immuno-oncology, immunotherapy and immuno-interventions to develop innovative healthcare strategies.
_______________________________________________________
WHAT TO EXPECT FROM BICOLL IN 2018:
– Extension of drug discovery cooperations on the Asian market –
Bicoll continues the activities aimed on the development in Japanese and South Korean market. It means the support of the current connections and development of the new ones as well as InnoMuNiCH project.
– Projected development of our analytical department and enlargement of medicinal chemistry team –
To support our customers in the best way and address all the needs Bicoll will look for new colleagues who have the experience in natural products and interest to be part of the international team working on the development of new molecules which can be used on the field of drug discovery, nutraceuticals, cosmetics and many others.
Stay informed and register for the newsletter (sign up here), LinkedIn (be a follower) and Twitter (@BicollGroup).