Abstract

Bridging the Gap between Academia and Industry at the National Phenotypic Screening Centre

Paul Andrews, Director of Operations, National Phenotypic Screening Centre (NPSC), University of Dundee

The National Phenotypic Screening Centre (NPSC) was established in 2015 with a mission to be the UK’s top facility for phenotypic drug discovery. The Scottish Government invested £8M to create a state-of-the-art facility within the top-ranked School of Life Sciences, University of Dundee, with a satellite screening facility at the TDI, University of Oxford. Both work closely with a unit led by Neil Carragher at the University of Edinburgh focusing on developing complex phenotypic assays. NPSC operates an open centre and is working with academics and clinicians in the UK and globally to create and validated new, physiologically-relevant predictive assays, leveraging the latest developments in biology and technology, and use them to screen a range of different in-house libraries (diversity and annotated sets). NPSC has assembled a full range of reader technologies, from high throughput confocal to high throughput flow cytometry, all on a High Res Biosolutions modular automation platform within Cat II enclosures at both Dundee and Oxford sites. Enterprise-level Infrastructure has been put in place to support large data volume collection, storage and computation. NPSC bridges between academia and industry and has recently launched the Phenomics Discovery Initiative (PDi) – a consortium open to Pharma and Biotech companies wishing to de-risk the development of challenging, complex, disease-focused phenotypic screening assays. Janssen/J&J is PDi’s founding member. Importantly, to progress phenotypic hits NPSC has access to a range of advanced target/pathway discovery technology platforms in Dundee, Edinburgh and Oxford as well as medicinal chemistry.