Principal Investigator (PI)
The Foundation is providing £189,683 in support.
Dr Rosario Díaz - Dr Fernando Aguilar
GSK provides in-kind contributions (including facilities and expertise from supporting scientists for HTS and GSK collection of compounds)
Leishmaniasis, a parasitic disease found in four continents, is the third most common cause of death caused by parasites in developing countries. Leishmaniasis has different clinical symptoms, and the visceral form, also known as kala-azar, is lethal if left untreated. Most existing treatments are expensive, with known toxicities and variable efficacy. There is increased resistance to these treatments for leishmaniasis. With research currently focused on developing an effective drug against these parasites, more compound profiling is required to characterise a fast-killing or time-dependent compound to help successful drug progression. At the Open Lab, the visiting scientists will seek to develop and validate an assay to measure the replication rate for intracellular parasites using fluorescent and qPCR methods.
“The collaboration with GSK is fundamental to my research, since their experience and know-how of the most modern and latest techniques and equipment will help us to develop the best assay. The equipment and facilities at Tres Cantos are simply not affordable for the academic community, and their support for our project is a boost to help us achieve our goals”. (Rosario Díaz, Open Lab scientist)