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news.Boston-area biopharmaceutical firm Cambria Biosciences has been awarded three new research grants totaling more than $700,000 from the National Institutes of Health, to support a drug discovery program for neurodegenerative diseases.
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Parkinson’s disease is the focus of two of Cambria’s phase I small business innovation research (SBIR) grants, one from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke and one from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Cambria investigators will use the SBIR funding to develop new disease models that incorporate both genetic and environmental features, in order to devise more efficacious therapies for this multifactorial neurodegenerative disorder.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), better known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, is the focus of Cambria’s third SBIR grant, from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. Cambria will study the molecular sites of action of riluzole, the only drug currently approved for the treatment of ALS, in order to provide insights into designing better medicines for the disease.
“Parkinson’s disease and ALS represent two devastating neurodegenerative diseases for which there are currently no truly effective therapies,” said Dr Leo Liu, president and chief scientific officer of Cambria. “These NIH grants leverage Cambria’s unique ability to develop predictive biological models of these diseases and to identify the molecular modes of action for promising compounds.”