The ALS Emergency Treatment Fund (ALS-ETF),  a nonprofit company created to provide near-term treatment options to sufferers of ALS, and Denovo Biomarkers (Denovo), a privately-held biotechnology company, have formed a partnership to explore using Denovo's technology to identify potential responder groups for drugs being studied in ALS patients.  This personalized medicine approach may accelerate drug development in ALS and other life-threatening disorders.

The partnership will integrate Denovo's pharmacogenomic technology into the analysis of biological samples obtained from expanded access programmes (EAP's) that ALS-ETF sponsors.  By identifying genomic biomarkers that correlate with patients' responsiveness to treatment, the partners seek to identify appropriate patient subsets for the conduct of subsequent trials.

"This exciting relationship with Denovo Biomarkers may accelerate the development of drugs for ALS and may help us provide useful information for patients and physicians," said Jess Rabourn , managing director of ALS-ETF.  Dr. Wen Luo , chief scientific officer for Denovo Biomarkers, noted, "This partnership leverages the mission of ALS-ETF and the broad utility of our platform. We hope that our combined efforts will lead to better, more targeted treatments for ALS."

Denovo Biomarkers, based in San Diego, is a privately-held biotechnology company providing novel biomarker approaches to personalized drug development. The company offers the industry's first platform and algorithm for de novo genomic biomarker discovery using archived clinical samples.