Agreement with Roche gives UCLA Stem Cell and Cancer Researchers Early Access to Leading-edge Technologies for the Advancement of Medical Research

An agreement between UCLA and Roche will provide stem cell and cancer researchers with leading-edge technologies that will drive research capabilities and further the understanding of complex disease.

The technologies, including the latest generation microarray systems from Roche NimbleGen, high-throughput screening instruments, genetic expression profilers and exome sequencing technologies will provide scientists with the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA and UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center with valuable technology directly from Roche’s research and development pipeline.

“Discoveries made by UCLA scientists while working with the technologies will help provide Roche scientists with insight on academic research and can be used to refine Roche operations or develop new applications for the equipment,” said Dr. Michael Teitell, a Broad and Jonsson center researcher who helped design the collaboration.

Under the agreement, Roche will also provide UCLA with advanced reagent, technologies and bioinformatics support to be used in the pursuit of discovering new predictive biomarkers, which will be used as targets for future therapeutics and diagnostics for a host of diseases.

The agreement opens the door for UCLA and Roche scientists to work collaboratively with an initial focus on developing even more effective technologies for academic and commercial use. Future developments, based on these technologies, could lead to clinical trials of promising diagnostics and therapeutics.

Robert Yates, Head of Roche Applied Science states “Our focus is to provide the scientific community with cutting-edge genomic tools that can rapidly advance their research. This collaboration is an innovative approach to working closely with leading institutes, such as UCLA, at an early stage of research in the pursuit of new predictive biomarkers”.

Mr. Yates further commented, “By working together at an early stage, we can optimize the technologies and provide the necessary support to improve detection and analysis, and ultimately, the success rate of biomarker discovery.”

Michael Teitell said UCLA researchers will submit project applications for research using the new technology and an advisory committee comprised of Roche and UCLA scientists will review and select the projects that propose the best use of the technology and which are most likely to succeed.