Agreement signed between Garvan, Cancer Therapeutics CRC and SYNkinase

The Garvan Institute of Medical Research and Cancer Therapeutics CRC (ASX: CTx) have signed a licence agreement with SYNkinase to develop and market a unique Pan-Kinase Binding Agent to help screen human cells and tissues and identify potential drug targets in diseased states.

The novel agent has the ability to detect most protein kinases - critical cell signalling proteins - within a biological sample. This detective ability provides the potential for the agent to become a valuable research tool for basic laboratory research as well as drug target identification.
In particular, it will facilitate the development of the ‘kinome profile’ of normal and diseased cells, which is useful for identifying potential drug markers.



The agent was discovered during a research collaboration between Professor Roger Daly of the Garvan Institute and Dr Ian Street, Dr Ian Holmes and Dr Scott Walker at Cancer Therapeutics CRC. Their aim was to design selective kinase enzyme inhibitors.

In contrast to other molecules tested, the Pan-Kinase Binding Agent binds tightly to more than 200 different kinases, making it a particularly unselective kinase inhibitor. Because of this property, the agent is being used to purify and characterise various protein kinases.



SYNkinase, a wholly owned subsidiary of Melbourne-based SYN|thesis Research Pty Ltd, has taken an exclusive licence to this technology in return for royalties on the sales of any products developed using the technology.



“This is a really exciting ‘tool compound’ that will greatly enhance the experimental range of many life science researchers,” said the Chairman of SYNkinase, Professor Andrew Wilks. “The applications to proteomics and chemical biology research should drive a great many new discoveries going forwards. Beyond that we are eyeing the further development of this technology into the diagnostics and prognostics arena.”



Cancer Therapeutics CRC is a small molecule drug discovery company based in Melbourne.

SYNkinase is a research company with a strong commitment to delivering novel research tools for the life science community. A wholly owned subsidiary of SYN|thesis Research, SYNkinase is located within its own laboratories at the Monash Institute for Pharmaceutical Sciences in Melbourne.