Screening Library Advances Drug Discovery Research at Temple University’s Moulder Centre

Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc has announced that the Moulder Centre for Drug Discovery Research at Temple University’s School of Pharmacy has selected the company’s Maybridge screening libraries to identify compounds that might be useful in treating health problems as diverse as Alzheimer’s disease, cancer and drug dependency. Thermo Fisher will provide the Moulder Centre with a custom compound library based initially on the 14,000-strong HitFinder™ collection. This library will be used within the university as well as by its continually expanding list of
academic, pharmaceutical and biotechnology partners. The Moulder Centre is led by Dr Magid Abou-Gharbia, a highly respected scientist whose work in the drug discovery field has produced five FDA-approved therapeutics. The centre conducts in-house research using its stateof- the-art laboratory facilities. These studies are currently focused on the identification of compounds targeting drug addiction and withdrawal symptoms as well as the development of Alzheimer’s disease. Each is built on a foundation of rational design that is based on ‘Lipinski's Rule
of Five’, which utilises both computer aided analysis and high-throughput screening assays.

With an expanded Maybridge HitFinder library of more than 20,000 candidate molecules, the team at the Moulder Centre hopes to screen a wide range of compounds. “We needed a large but manageable library that was still flexible enough to meet the needs of our drug discovery programs and those of our collaborators,” said Dr Abou-Gharbia. “We aim to expand the already excellent HitFinder library by taking advantage of the extensive range of related compounds offered by the Maybridge service. The Maybridge experts provided exceptional technical and data support, making it easy to add the new molecules to our collection database.”

In addition to conducting its own research, the Moulder Centre collaborates with many research partners, using its expertise and resources to enrich and expand their drug discovery pipelines. “One of our primary aims is to provide a conduit that helps researchers move forward from their exciting early stage research and turn their discoveries into drugs to treat disease,” said Dr Abou-Gharbia. “Plugging this gap will help to ensure that research laboratories, especially those in the academic sector, have the support they need to move efficiently and accurately through the drug discovery process.”