SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--NanoSurface Biomedical, a leading provider of biomimetic cell-based assay products and services, announced today the launch of the NanoSurface Car(ina)™ platform for highly predictive pre-clinical drug screening, using structurally matured human induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) derived heart tissues. This innovative human stem cell-based technology enables drug developers to accurately test the safety and efficacy of new drugs earlier in the drug development process and promises to help get safer medicines to market in less time and at lower cost.
Bringing a new medicine to market often takes over a decade and costs more than $2 billion. Cardiac safety issues often remain undetected until late stage clinical trials, or even after market release, contributing to high failure costs and potential harm to patients. Standard pre-clinical animal and non-human in vitro tests often fail to accurately predict how a drug will affect human patients. This has motivated the use of human cells, including stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes, for pre-clinical drug testing. It has remained a major challenge to create cardiac tissues from stem cells that sufficiently mimic the adult human heart to accurately predict drug effects in patients.
The NanoSurface Car(ina) platform uses human stem cell-derived cardiac micro-tissues that closely mimic structural and functional characteristics of the adult human heart. “Biomimetic structural cues trick cells in the dish into developing like they are in the human body,” said NanoSurface CEO Michael Cho. After treatment with candidate drugs, changes to the electrical activity of these cells can be monitored as an indication of cardiac safety issues, including pro-arrhythmia. These and other drug effects can be evaluated in high-throughput, enabling rapid screening of thousands of drugs.
“At NanoSurface, we strive to make cells in the dish resemble cells in the body,” said Dr. Nicholas Geisse, Chief Science Officer of NanoSurface Biomedical. “The Car(ina) platform gives researchers access to human-relevant data earlier in the drug development process, improving confidence that new therapeutics will translate to the clinic.”
For more information on Car(ina), visit www.nanosurfacebio.com/carina.
About NanoSurface Biomedical
NanoSurface Biomedical is a biotechnology company based in Seattle, WA that develops biomimetic technologies to enhance cell-based assays and accelerate drug development. NanoSurface was founded in 2015. www.nanosurfacebio.com
