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Mayo Clinic Collaborates with Second Genome to Develop Microbiome Therapeutics
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The Mayo Clinic and Second Genome have announced a partnership in a microbiome research program to develop novel new therapies to treat a variety of diseases.
“The microbiome is an important area of medical research for Mayo Clinic, and this collaboration represents a broad and significant effort in our attempt to develop therapeutics targeting microbiome-mediated pathways,” Heidi Nelson, MD, director of the microbiome program in the Mayo Clinic Center for Individualized Medicine, said in a press release. “We believe that Second Genome’s drug discovery capability complements our clinical expertise, and our hope is that together we can develop new treatment approaches for patients across a wide range of diseases with significant unmet clinical need.”
Second Genome has developed treatment products for inflammation and metabolic disease, and the collaboration gives Second Genome access to the Mayo Clinic’s research and clinical expertise.
The goal of the planned research is to discover the biological pathways in the gut microbiome implicated in gluten sensitivity, Clostridium difficile, rheumatoid arthritis, colon cancer and bacterial vaginosis, and to develop novel therapies to target those pathways.
“The importance of the microbiome in a wide range of diseases is increasingly obvious,” Peter B. DiLaura, CEO of Second Genome, said in the release. “Applying microbiome science to novel therapeutic approaches requires a robust platform for understanding the mechanisms of interaction between microbiome and host biology, coupled with deep clinical expertise. We believe that the combined expertise of Second Genome and the world-class clinicians and researchers at Mayo Clinic will accelerate our ability to discover and develop new transformative therapies that improve the lives of patients.”
The Mayo Clinic is making an equity investment into Second Genome, but the financial details were not disclosed in the press release.