For immediate release: Thursday 3 April 2003

Anglo-Canadian consortium announce 3D vision

Unravelling the structure of hundreds of human proteins will be the goal of an ambitious £40 million partnership announced today by the Wellcome Trust, GlaxoSmithKline and four of Canada's leading research funding agencies.

The newly formed Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC) is a three-year initiative which will focus its efforts on determining the three dimensional structure of more than 350 human proteins. The consortium's goal is to encourage the development of new and improved drugs and other healthcare products; it is the only public-private partnership worldwide to undertake such a targeted programme of research.

Established as a charity, the consortium will operate from research laboratories at the Universities of Oxford and Toronto, and collaborate with the European Bioinformatics Institute in Cambridge.

The protein targets that will be studied by the SGC will have significant relevance to human health and will include proteins associated with cancer, neurological disorders and malaria. Information gleaned from the project will provide an insight into the proteins' functions, their role in safeguarding health or increasing susceptibility to disease and their potential as therapeutic targets for new medicines. The consortium will aim to produce the first protein structures by the end of 2003; all structures will be released freely into the public domain.

Professor Aled Edwards, Chief Executive of the Structural Genomics Consortium, said: "I am excited by the opportunity to provide protein structures for the global research community. This will enable scientists to better understand our genetic information and to put the genome to practical use. We are particularly looking forward to collaborating with the biomedical research community to rapidly place the protein structures into a functional context."

The SGC will utilise the vast resource of the Human Genome Project (HGP), which has provided researchers with the sequence of the 30 000 to 40 000 genes in the human body. With the HGP nearing completion, the SGC will move on to the next significant challenge which is to explore the structure and function of proteins encoded by these genes.

Professor Jean Thomas, a Governor of the Wellcome Trust, said: "This collaborative project is another step in realising some of the potential of the Human Genome Project. It will focus on a fraction of the proteins that have emerged, selected for their relevance to human health, and is consistent with the Trust's mission. The structural insights should provide underpinning for drug design and also lead to advances in understanding of the basic biology of these proteins. This venture is a natural progression for the Trust, whose commitment to sequencing the human genome is extending to related areas to ensure translation of that information into health benefits."

Dr Drake Eggleston, Vice President of Computational, Analytical and Structural Sciences at GSK, commented: "GSK is delighted to partner with the Wellcome Trust and Canada's leading research funding agencies to increase the speed at which vital protein structures are made available to the scientific community. The availability of detailed 3D protein structures provides important insight for drug discovery and accelerates the speed at which we can find new treatments for patients who need them."

The Wellcome Trust and GSK initiated the project and will contribute £18 million and £3 million, respectively, to the consortium. The Canadian consortium members are Genome Canada, the Ontario government's Challenge Fund, the Ontario Innovation Trust and the Canadian Institutes of Health who are collectively contributing £19 million to the consortium.

Dr Martin Godbout, President and Chief Executive Officer of Genome Canada, said: "In an era of increasingly complex scientific research, international collaboration involving partners from both the public and private sectors is, we believe, an essential and innovative approach to expand our knowledge. We are extremely proud to be working with the Wellcome Trust, GSK and our Canadian partners. We anticipate this international partnership will open up competitive space for biotech and pharmaceutical companies, increasing the likelihood of success in developing new products for unmet medical needs."

Dr Alan Bernstein, President of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, said: "This consortium is a major and exciting 'first' in health research. This Canadian and British collaboration will enable all researchers around the world to have access to important structural information on proteins involved in health and disease. The Structural Genomics Consortium is a great example of international scientific cooperation to further global efforts to improve human health."

Media contacts

Noorece Ahmed
Wellcome Trust Media Office
Tel: +44 (0)20 7611 8540
E-mail: n.ahmed@wellcome.ac.uk

Louise Dunn
R&D Communications, GlaxoSmith Kline
Tel: +44 (0)20 8047 5495
E-mail: louise.a.dunn@gsk.com

Janet Wong
U of T Public Affairs
Tel: 416-978-5949
E-mail: jf.wong@utoronto.ca

Anie Perrault
Genome Canada
Tel: 613-751-4460 ext. 13
E-mail: aperrault@genomecanada.ca

Bob Kalbfleisch
Ontario Research and Development Challenge Fund/Ontario Innovation Trust
Tel: 519-572-1112
E-mail: bob.kalbfleisch@agricorp.com

Janet Weichel McKenzie
Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Tel: 613-941-4563
E-mail: jweichel@cihr.ca

Notes to Editors

1. The scientific director of the SGC, Professor Aled Edwards, will be based in research laboratories in Toronto and will direct and collaborate with a UK-based team in Oxford. The consortium is currently recruiting staff and is expected to be operational early in 2004.

2. Aled Edwards is an Associate Professor in the Banting and Best Department of Medical Research at the University of Toronto, and a Senior Scientist at the Ontario Cancer Institute. Since 1997 he has been jointly leading a structural proteomics progamme at the University of Toronto. This programme is linked with two of the NIH funding structural genomics centres. Prof Edwards is also a co-founder of Affinium Pharmaceutical, a privately held drug discover company of which Aled Edwards was CEO (1998-2000) and CSO (1998-2002).

3. The SGC will target more than 350 proteins selected by consortium members and chosen for their relevance to human health. Other criteria adopted for the selection process includes consultation with and interest by the biological community, expertise available within the consortium, likely interest within the pharmaceutical industry (to increase the chances of further research being pursued), and scientific impact.

4. The European Bioinformatics Institute (EBI), located at the Wellcome Trust Genome Campus, will provide high class structural bioinformatics support to the SGC initiative. The EBI is a non-profit academic organisation that forms part of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory. Its mission is to ensure that the growing body of information from molecular biology and genome research is placed in the public domain and is accessible freely to all facets of the scientific community in ways that promote scientific progress.

5. The Wellcome Trust is an independent research funding charity, whose mission is to foster and promote research with the aim of improving human and animal health. The SGC supports the underlying mission of the Trust and builds on the foundations of the Human Genome Project to which the Trust has made a considerable financial investment. The SGC will contribute to the Trust's commitment of translating the genome sequence into practical healthcare benefits.

6. GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) is one of the world's leading research-based pharmaceutical and healthcare companies and is committed to improving the quality of human life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer. The 15 000 people working in GSK's global R&D organization discover, develop, register, and support the commercialization of prescription medicines and vaccines for the treatment and prevention of human disease. In 2002 GSK invested £2.6 billion in research and development at more than 20 sites in 8 countries. For more information visit: http://science.gsk.com

7. Created in February 2000, Genome Canada is the primary funding and information resource relating to genomics and proteomics in Canada. Dedicated to developing and implementing a national strategy in genomics and proteomics research for the benefit of all Canadians, it has so far received $375 million from the Government of Canada to establish five Genome Centres across the country and enable Canada to become a world leader in genomics and proteomics research. To date, Genome Canada has invested more than $294 million in 56 large-scale genomics research projects across Canada.

8. The Ontario Genomics Institute (OGI) is one of five genome centres across Canada working in partnership with Genome Canada to support national genomics research. OGI's goal is to position Ontario at the forefront of the international genomics research and industry.

9. Created in 1997 by the Ontario government, the Ontario Research and Development Challenge Fund (ORDCF) promotes world-class research of interest to the private sector; encourages collaboration between the private sector and research institutions; attracts and retains top scientists and enables talented young scientists to pursue their research interests; and helps Ontario's research institutions build their R&D capacity, so they are able to obtain funding from other sources. The Ontario government has committed over $1.2 billion to the Challenge Fund for investing in leading-edge R&D. Through the Challenge Fund, the province has invested $435.4 million in 103 research projects. Private sector and research institution partners are investing an additional $1.1 billion bringing the total value of Challenge Fund supported research projects to $1.5 billion.

10. Established by the Province of Ontario 1999, the Ontario Innovation Trust (OIT) is assisting the province's universities, hospitals, colleges and other non-profit organizations to carry out scientific research and technology development by enhancing the infrastructure needed for research. The trust was originally created with an endowment of $750 million. Since that time the government's total investment commitment in research infrastructure, through the trust, has increased to over $1 billion. To date the trust has announced investments of more than $667.4 million to support about 876 research projects.

11. The Canadian Institutes of Health Research is Canada's premier agency for health research. Its objective is to excel, according to internationally accepted standards of scientific excellence, in the creation of new knowledge and its translation into improved health for Canadians, more effective health services and products and a strengthened health care system. Created in June 2000, the CIHR concept is internationally innovative and involves a multi-disciplinary approach, organized through a framework of 13 "virtual" institutes; each one dedicated to a specific area of focus, linking and supporting researchers pursuing common goals. The institutes embrace four pillars of research, including biomedical, clinical science, health systems and services, and the social, cultural and other factors that affect the health of populations.