BSi and OMJPI enter development agreement for novel neurological and psychiatric disease therapeutics

Johns Hopkins Brain Science InstituteJan 19 2011

The Johns Hopkins Brain Science Institute (BSi) announced today that it has entered into an agreement with Ortho-McNeil-Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc. (OMJPI) to advance the development of novel therapeutics for neurological and psychiatric diseases.

Under terms of the agreement, OMJPI will support translational research at BSi and OMJPI scientists and BSI researchers will collaborate to identify new therapeutic targets and pathways for psychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders. Eventually, those targets and pathways may be the focus of new drug development programs at OMJPI.

Under the terms of the agreement, OMJPI will have the option to license assays to newly identified targets from the BSi, and, in exchange, OMJPI will share tool compounds with BSI researchers for biological target identification and validation.

"By combining our vast reservoir of knowledge and talent, the Brain Science Institute hopes to start the next generation of neuropsychiatric pharmaceuticals down the pipeline by combining complimentary skills and expertise of academic and pharmaceutical scientists," says John Griffin, M.D., director of the BSi, University Distinguished Service Professor of the Department of Neurology, and professor of neuroscience and pathology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

"This partnership should speed bench-to-bedside development of better treatments for bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and neurodegenerative diseases," says Jeffrey D. Rothstein, M.D., Ph.D., co-director of the BSi and director of the BSi NeuroTranslational Program, whose Hopkins faculty scientists already work to identify novel drug targets arising from their work. Rothstein is also a professor of neurology and neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.