Respiratory Disease Research

COPD and asthma drug discovery

Respiratory diseases (excluding infectious diseases such as TB and lung cancer) affect millions of people worldwide. Domainex has expertise in developing drug candidates that specifically act at the lungs.

The most significant of the respiratory diseases (RD) are chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma. COPD alone is estimated to have been responsible for more than 3 million deaths in 2015 (WHO data). Most treatments for RD are inhaled drugs, and this area of research is a specialised one, in which Domainex has developed significant drug design expertise in.

Respiratory Disease Research at Domainex

One example of a client in the RD therapeutic area is Prof Clive Robinson of St Georges University of London, funded by the Wellcome Trust. The programme began with Prof Robinson’s research showing the essential role played by the catalytic activity of a house dust mite allergen, the cysteine protease Der p1, in the initiation and maintenance of the allergic response that gives rise to the asthmatic condition. Medicinal chemists at Domainex worked closely with Prof Robinson’s team to design and prepare inhibitors of Der p1. This work was facilitated by the established Domainex expertise in protease inhibitor design, and led to the invention of a pre-clinical candidate drug with properties very well-suited to inhaled delivery. Click here to see the full case study.

If you are interested in respiratory drug discovery, then Domainex’s expertise in this specialised field of medicinal chemistry, combined with our wide-ranging biology capabilities in relevant drug target classes such as enzymes, GPCRs, ion channels and protein-protein interactions, and our network of partners in solid-state chemistry, can expedite your programmes.

Domainex press releases in the respiratory disease field:

Domainex article featured on the front cover of Molecular Pharmacology
20th December 2018

Domainex Reports Success of its Lead Compound in Pre-clinical Model of COPD and Secures £1.4m Biomedical Catalyst Award
9th July 2014

Domainex programme shows great promise for the treatment of inflammatory diseases, such as Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD)
7th April 2014