Axol Bioscience Ltd., a pluripotent stem cell technology provider for drug discovery, entered into an agreement with StrataStem, a research-led biotechnology company, to access and commercialize its extensive collection of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) patient samples. Harnessing its stem cell expertise, Axol will reprogram these patient samples into induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPSCs) that can then be differentiated into a wide range of brain cells, including neurons and neuroinflammatory cells. Grown in vitro, these cells can provide patient specific human brain models from a large cohort of AD patients – to create a ‘clinical trial in a dish’.

Seeking to accelerate the search for effective treatments of AD, the work specifically focuses on sporadic AD (sAD), the most common form of the disease accounting for over 95% of all cases. sAD has no specific family link and is caused by a combination of genetics, the environment and a person’s lifestyle. StrataStem’s collection of donor materials, including fibroblasts and blood samples, has been obtained from fully consenting sAD patients and healthy donors.

All materials are supported with extensive longitudinal data on disease state, medical and lifestyle history, and family health summaries. Through the creation of iPSCs and resulting differentiated brain cells from this large-scale Alzheimer’s cohort, Axol aims to enable patient stratification prior to clinical trials for AD treatments, allowing drug discovery companies to select the most responsive patients for trial. Axol’s in vitro approach offers an effective alternative to existing in vivo methods, with the potential to reduce the risk, costs, and timelines of drug discovery and development for AD, with more relevant models of disease.

Liam Taylor, CEO, Axol Bioscience, said: “Here at Axol, we are committed to using iPSCs to make better in vitro models of human disease, expanding our understanding and de-risk drug development. The exclusive agreement with StrataStem is a major strategic move for Axol, bringing us to the forefront of AD drug discovery and development. By commercializing this extensive iPSC library, our drug discovery customers can easily access in vitro models for sAD and interrogate potential mechanisms of the disease more fully.

Chris Ward, CSO and Co-founder, StrataStem, said, “We are delighted to be entering this collaboration with the team at Axol. The recent US Federal Food and Drug Administration Agency (FDA) Modernization Act 2.0 has paved the way for the use of cell-based assays to investigate drug safety and efficacy, including this innovative ‘clinical trial in a dish’ approach. We expect this advancement to de-risk drug development and expedite the process, while also providing valuable cost and time savings.”