VistaGen Inc announced the initiation of a collaboration with the Mount Sinai School of Medicine (MSSM) for development of an in vitro drug toxicity screening system based on proprietary human kidney cells and isolation techniques. The therapeutic use of many drugs is limited by renal toxicity. Because the animal-based approaches used by drug companies for the evaluation of nephrotoxicity are less than ideal due to inter-species differences, it is expected that advances in this drug screening technology will be of significant value to VistaGen's pharmaceutical customers.

This new technology development collaboration will enhance VistaGen's on-going internal programs and those academic programs already underway at ReNeuron (human neuronal stem cells), University of Colorado (human embryonic stem cells), and University of Florida (hepatocytes). VistaGen's proprietary stem cell assays offer drug companies more clinically relevant and cost-effective techniques for discovery, target validation, and assays for predicting the safety and efficacy of new drug candidates early during drug development. Partial funding of the collaboration on the human kidney cells is being provided by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, National Institutes of Health (NIH), under Contract No. N43-ES-15472.

Dr. Ralph Snodgrass, President and CEO of VistaGen, presenting today at the American Society of Nephrology World Congress in San Francisco, CA, said "By combining the talents of VistaGen scientists and Dr. Patricia Wilson's laboratory at MSSM, we are optimistic that we will create a clinically relevant assay that will allow drug companies to identify in the earliest stages of drug development those compounds that are less likely to fail in clinical trials due to nephrotoxity in humans. We are also pleased that the NIH has once again found value in our stem cell platform for predictive efficacy and toxicity."