ART enters collaboration to develop molecular imaging apps

MONTREAL—Advanced Research Technologies Inc. (ART), aCanadian medical device company and a provider of optical molecular imagingproducts for the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries, recently announcedthat a collaboration agreement has been signed with the National ResearchCouncil of Canada's Institute for Biological Sciences (NRC-IBS) for thedevelopment of client-oriented diagnostic applications using the company'sproprietary time domain technology, in the emerging discipline of molecularimaging.

NRC-IBS and ART have agreed to establish a partnershipconsisting of service, research and development activities. In collaborationwith NRC-IBS, new diagnostic applications of ART's time domain technology andequipment for use in disease models will be developed and adopted by ART forapplication notes.

"The NRC-IBS is very pleased to collaborate with ART for thedevelopment of better diagnostics using molecular imaging, which can helpidentify and characterize brain-specific targets, and develop improvedtherapies for neurodegenerative diseases affecting the aging population.Optical imaging-based approaches also promise to accelerate drug evaluation andshorten the time to their clinical application," said Dr. Abedelnasser Abulrob,Research Officer at the NRC-IBS.

Dr. Abulrob recently participated in a webcast to thescientific research community, launching ART's new in vivo optical imager,Optix MX2. During this webcast, Dr. Abulrob provided experimental examples fromhis own research on the capabilities of Optix's analytical software package,OptiView. Dr. Abulrob's team has been using the Optix system for newapplications of optical imaging and fluorescence lifetime, in addition to theevaluation of investigative drugs in stroke, Alzheimer's disease and braincancer.

"The scientific exchange and collaboration between theNRC-IBS and ART has already proven beneficial for advancing both scientificdiscovery and technology development in the emerging field of molecularimaging. This collaboration agreement with the NRC-IBS creates newopportunities to respond to the challenges faced by our customers in drugdevelopment. Now, by contributing to enable novel Optix applications, the NRCwill play an important role in advancing our plan to develop solutions for ourclients and help them shorten the drug development cycle," said Mr. SebastienGignac, ART's president and CEO.