Takeda, Sanford-Burnham Launch Heart Failure Collaboration

Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute at Lake Nona said it is launching a two-year partnership with Takeda Pharmaceutical focused on treating heart failure. The value of the collaboration was not disclosed.

The partners will study the potential role of several gene regulatory proteins as targets for new treatments. Researchers from Takeda and Sanford-Burnham will join colleagues from the institute’s Conrad Prebys Center for Chemical Genomics to screen its library of compounds.

The researchers aim to identify a molecule that can reactivate metabolism in heart failure patients by restoring the heart’s ability to burn nutritional fuels for pump function.

“My team and colleagues at the Institute have been studying the machinery that controls metabolism in the heart for years. The partnership with Takeda will accelerate our progress and bring it closer to the clinic,” Daniel P. Kelly, M.D., Tavistock distinguished professor and scientific director of Sanford-Burnham at Lake Nona, said in a statement.

The new collaboration is the third between Sanford-Burnham and Takeda over the past five years. The partners launched their first collaboration in 2011, focused on identifying and validating obesity-related biomarkers and new drug targets, as well as speeding up development of new obesity treatments along with Florida Hospital—with which the institute runs a Translational Research Institute for Metabolism and Diabetes. The partnership was renewed in 2013.