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Pfizer, WARF sign stem cell research deal

Pharmaceutical company to partner with major nonprofit organization in Madison

The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation and Pfizer, the number one biopharmaceutical corporation in the world, signed a research license this week for the use of human embryonic stem cells.

According to WARF spokesperson Janet Kelly, the dialogue between Pfizer and WARF has existed for over a year.

WARF is a separate entity from University of Wisconsin and is a non-profit organization designed to support and instigate research at UW.

“We’re very excited to work with Pfizer. They are a world leader in pharmaceuticals and therapies,” Kelly said. “This is a great opportunity for us from a business perspective.”

She added this has the potential to improve many lives here in Wisconsin and around the world, and also fuels the economy locally with new businesses and employment opportunities.

WARF is no stranger to licensing agreements with biopharmaceutical companies, according to Kelly, as over the past several years, they have worked with primer corporations such as Invitrogen, BioTime and Geron.

In January, Geron was allowed by the Food and Drug Administration to begin the world’s first human clinical trial of embryonic stem cell-based therapy.

“[This collaboration] is important not only to WARF, but also the University of Wisconsin-Madison because this is the home to the birth, really, of stem cell science,” Kelly said.

Jamie Thomson’s work at UW in 1998 led to the first successful isolation of human embryonic stem cell lines.

In 2007, Thomson’s laboratory pioneered a method for altering human skin cells to appear as embryonic stem cells, thus creating a possible alternative to using human embryos.

Pfizer spokesperson Elizabeth Power agreed with Kelly, citing the enormous potential stem cell research offers in the development of new medicines and the amazing possibilities of their collaboration with WARF.

“The tremendous benefits of being a very large biopharmaceutical research organization, like Pfizer, is we have the ability to partner with leading institutions all over the world, and WARF is one,” Power said.

Power added Pfizer has a three-pronged approach to utilizing stem cells, the first of which is using them to enhance safety testing in early stages of compounds they are working on. The group also uses stem cells to screen and find disease targets in an effort to develop new therapies. Finally, they are researching the potential to develop a stem cell based therapy for disease.

Several weeks ago, Pfizer announced collaboration with the University College London to work together to develop a stem cell based therapy to help macular degeneration.

“Our researchers have been watching the evolution of the science in this space all along and we feel that being licensed through WARF … is important in that it helps advance our science,” Power said. “And also, we’re collaborating with the leading institution in this science space.”