Launch of the European research project SCR&Tox
April 15, 2011. (France) – The SCR&Tox project coordinated by Marc Peschanski (Inserm, Istem U861), was officially launched on January 13th in Evry (Paris Region), France. SCR&Tox is a collaborative research project co-funded by the European Commission within the framework of the 7th FP (Health Priority) and by COLIPA (the European Cosmetics Association). Financed for 5 years, this consortium brings together 14 academic and industrial partners from 5 European countries. SCR&Tox aims at addressing the unmet need for test methods for predicting toxicity of drugs, chemicals and cosmetic ingredients. In the development of products for use by humans, it is vital to identify compounds with toxic properties at an early stage of their development, in order to avoid spending time and resource on unsuitable and potentially unsafe candidate products. Human pluripotent stem cell lines offer a unique opportunity to develop a wide variety of human cell-based test systems as they may be expanded indefinitely and triggered to differentiate into any cell type. SCR&Tox has been designed to make use of these two attributes to provide in vitro assays for predicting toxicity of pharmaceutical compounds and cosmetic ingredients and to address all issues related with biological and technological resources to meet this goal. Marc Peschanski, coordinator of the network, underscores the major paradigm shift in predictive toxicology that pluripotent stem cells will permit in the coming years: “Evaluation of toxicants calls for new models that will allow assessing toxicity pathway responses in vitro. Derivatives of pluripotent stem cell lines are likely the best candidates to implement this new strategy, as most relevant and reliable model systems that can also be robust and scalable in order to meet the challenges of industrial-scale screens. The SCR&Tox program has been structured in order to provide all necessary resources and technologies for exploring this potential. Human pluripotent stem cells will be obtained and expanded from a diversity of donors, to obtain a glimpse of the effects of the genetic diversity. They will be differentiated into 5 different cell types representing organs of particular interest for toxicology (liver, heart, brain, skin and muscle). Methodologies will be developed for exploring molecular mechanisms perturbed by toxicants. At half-term of the project, these resources should be ready and proof of concepts will then be sought by developing toxicity assays using them, first on the bench then, at a final stage, on industrial platforms.” The SCR&Tox project is part of a research cluster named SEURAT (for Safety Evaluation Ultimately Replacing Animal Testing) co-funded in a unique joint effort by the European Commission and COLIPA with an overall budget of €50 Million. SCR&Tox is intricately associated to the 6 other consortia of the SEURAT research cluster, sharing biological, technological and methodological resources. Proof of concept of the proposed pluripotent stem cell-based assays for toxicology will be provided on the basis of toxicity pathways and test compounds identified by other consortia. About Inserm Founded in 1964, the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (Inserm) is a public scientific and technological institute which operates under the joint authority of the French Ministry of Health and French Ministry of Research. As the only French public research institute to focus entirely on human health, in 2008 Inserm took on the responsibility for the strategic, scientific and operational coordination of biomedical research. This key role as coordinator comes naturally to Inserm thanks to the scientific quality of its teams and its ability to conduct translational research, from the laboratory to the patient’s bed. www.inserm.fr About I-Stem The Institute for Stem cell Therapy and Exploration of Monogenic diseases (I-Stem, INSERM/UEVE 861), has been created the first of January 2005. The objective of I-Stem is the development of treatments intended for monogenic diseases, founded on the strong potential of stem cells for substitutive and regenerative therapies. A second original objective of I-Stem is the development of cell models representative of pathologies on the basis of human pluripotent stem cell lines each carrying a mutant gene associated with a given disease. These models could also be used as a basis for screening compounds libraries in order to discover and better characterize potential drugs. www.istem.eu About Inserm Transfert Founded in 2000, Inserm Transfert SA is the private subsidiary of the French National Institute of the Health and Medical Research (Inserm), dedicated to technology transfer (from invention disclosure to industrial partnership). Inserm Transfert manages European and International research projects, supports preclinical, clinical and post-marketing studies. Since 2009, Inserm Transfert has run a proof of concept fund. The company is also committed to seed financing in the biotech sector, through its dedicated fund Inserm Transfert Initiative. www.inserm-transfert.fr To know more on the project, please see: http://www.scrtox.eu(opens in new window)
Countries
Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, United Kingdom