PharmatrophiX, Initially Funded by the Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation, Announces Exclusive Global Collaboration...( ...)

Promise of revolutionary orally-administered drugs to combat Alzheimer's began journey 8 years ago

"Finding a needle in a haystack - 4 molecules out of a million"

NEW YORK, Aug. 6 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- New therapeutics funded by the Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation (ADDF), have achieved a significant milestone in their development as they advance toward the clinic, the ADDF announced today. PharmatrophiX, a biotechnology company founded in 2005 with funding from ADDF, has entered into an exclusive collaboration with Elan Corporation to research, develop, and commercialize a portfolio of small-molecule compounds that show promise in treating Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative conditions.

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20090805/DC57332LOGO)

"The road to this discovery was a search for a needle in a haystack," says Howard Fillit, M.D., Executive Director of ADDF, the only public charity whose sole mission is to fund drug discovery and development to prevent, treat, and cure Alzheimer's disease and cognitive aging.

The journey began when Frank Longo, M.D., Ph.D., began receiving funding from ADDF eight years ago while at UCSF (and then later at University of North Carolina) to find small molecules with the features of large biological agents that could both effectively combat neurodegenerative damage and be administered orally rather than intravenously - a challenge that has eluded researchers for years.

Dr. Longo, with the help of his UCSF colleague Stephen Massa, M.D., Ph.D., set out to find small molecules that could activate a receptor on bra
'/>"/>