ST. LOUIS, Oct. 4 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Sigma-Aldrich announced today that it has entered into a collaboration with the Institute of Research in Immunology and Cancer (IRIC) of the Universite de Montreal. This collaboration, made possible through grants from Genome Quebec and contributions by Sigma-Aldrich, will leverage Sigma’s RNA Interference (RNAi) technologies for the purpose of identifying potential new drug targets.
Sigma-Aldrich and the Universite de Montreal have signed an agreement whereby the Institute’s High Throughput Screening facility gains access to Sigma-Aldrich’s RNAi intellectual property portfolio and its MISSION(R) shRNA library collection for both human and mouse genomes. This agreement marks the latest of a number of licensing and research collaborations the company has made as an ongoing commitment to bring cutting-edge technologies to researchers worldwide. By adopting the MISSION(R) shRNA library as their platform for RNAi screening, The University of Montreal will be utilizing the collective expertise of The RNAi Consortium (TRC), which consists of a partnership among the Broad Institute, MIT, Harvard, Dana Farber, Sigma- Aldrich as well as other research organizations and major pharmaceutical companies. In exchange, Sigma-Aldrich plans to utilize feedback from the collaboration to further its understanding of specific target function and to continue the development of tools for high throughput drug discovery.
“We are eager to work with the Universite de Montreal to provide researchers access to the Sigma-Aldrich MISSION(R) RNAi portfolio of products and intellectual property,” said David Smoller, Ph.D., President of Sigma- Aldrich’s Research Biotechnology business unit. “RNAi is becoming the leading technology used by researchers for the advancement of drug discovery, commitment to this technology by the University and the investment of Canadian government positions the facility to be a leader in this effort.”
About Sigma-Aldrich: Sigma-Aldrich is a leading Life Science and High Technology company. Its biochemical and organic chemical products and kits are used in scientific and genomic research, biotechnology, pharmaceutical development, the diagnosis of disease and as key components in pharmaceutical and other high technology manufacturing. The Company has customers in life science companies, university and government institutions, hospitals, and in industry. Over one million scientists and technologists use its products. Sigma-Aldrich operates in 36 countries and has 7,700 employees providing excellent service worldwide. Sigma-Aldrich is committed to Accelerating Customer Success through Leadership in Life Science, High Technology and Service. For more information about Sigma-Aldrich, please visit its award- winning Web site at http://www.sigma-aldrich.com.
Cautionary Statement: This release contains forward-looking statements relating to future performance, goals, strategic actions and initiatives and similar intentions and beliefs and other statements regarding the Companies’ expectations, goals, beliefs, intentions and the like, which involve assumptions regarding the Companies’ operations and conditions in the markets the Companies serve. The Companies do not undertake any obligation to update these forward-looking statements.
CONTACT: Sean Battles of Sigma-Aldrich, +1-314-286-7616,
sean.battles@sial.com
Web site: http://www.sigma-aldrich.com//
