Chemical Biology Platform
Our mission
Empower creative scientists to accelerate the understanding and treatment of disease with unique libraries of diverse small molecules utilized in powerful new biological assays, and make the data accessible to the global community.
A central goal of chemical biology is to harness the power of synthetic chemistry to discover and elucidate molecular pathways fundamental to cell and disease biology. The creation and use of small molecules to probe the functional genome is a fertile area of research that facilitates the translation of biological insights into powerful new medicines. The Chemical Biology platform is comprised of scientists from a wide range of disciplines (chemistry, biology, computational science, software and automation engineering), all working cooperatively toward this goal in a systematic and thorough manner. Through the use of synthetic chemistry and high-throughput screening, coupled with computational analysis, we enable biologists to discover new research tools for biology, and we enable chemists to understand how specific chemical properties influence particular biological processes.
Platform operations are divided into three core areas of expertise:
- Chemistry
Our diversity-oriented synthesis (DOS) platform harnesses the power of split-and-pool synthesis to build large collections of both natural-product like molecules and small molecules based on novel core structures that are amenable for use in any type of chemical genetic or chemical genomic experiment. Efficient synthetic pathways result in collections of small molecules having skeletal, stereochemical, and appendage diversity. The diverse skeletons and stereochemistries ensure that the appendages are positioned in multiple orientations about the surface of the molecules. Ideally, these pathways also yield compounds having the potential for site- and stereoselective attachment of appendages during follow up chemistry. - Informatics
The informatics platform manages data collection and integration throughout the end-to-end process from chemical synthesis through screening and data analysis. Electronic lab notebooks and an analytical chemistry data warehouse capture critical information about the synthesis of compounds that are later used for screening and make this data available during the analysis of screening results. These tools enable a more comprehensive analysis of assay results which provides better biological understanding and leads to more informed decisions. Automated lab management systems enable high-throughput operation and improve data quality by eliminating error-prone manual processes. - Screening
The screening facility has been in operation for over 10 years and its highly successful Investigator-Initiated Screening Program has facilitated small molecule screening projects for more than 140 different research groups from throughout the U.S. and abroad. We are currently completing a major undertaking to enhance the screening facility with five new, state-of-the-art automation systems for compound management and screening. These new systems will enable the storing and handling of up to 500,000 compounds, and will provide the functionality and flexibility to perform a wide range of assays with even greater production capacity. These assays include both target-based biochemical screens and cell-based phenotypic screens, using novel screening approaches (GE-HTS, high-content imaging, RNAi combined with small molecules) with relevance to several disease areas including psychiatric disease, cancer, infectious disease and metabolic disease.
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