LABORATORY INFORMATICS
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re-emerging with a newfound interest, driven not only by the increasing requirements to fulfil the unmet need as it persists as the world-leading cause of death, but in the application of AI in being able to drive new and meaningful insights to help meet patients’ needs. Therefore, CardiaTec finds itself incredibly well placed to help drive innovation forwards within this space, now supported by a great syndicate of investors.’
Expanding AI It has recently been announced that AI-powered drug discovery company Healx has announced that is opening new labs at Chesterford Research Park. Healx, specialises in using AI models to find candidate drugs to help treat rare diseases. This is particularly important in this field as rare diseases can be much harder to treat as there is insufficient investment in these conditions due to the small number of people suffering from them. In addition, rare diseases are often not well studied and there is a limited understanding of many of the aspects necessary to support a drug discovery programme. Healx aims to change this through the application of AI. The company uses AI models helps to solve these challenges by analysing millions of drug and disease data points to find novel connections that could be turned into new treatment opportunities. Dr Neil Thompson, Chief Scientific
Officer, Healx said: ‘Historically, we have worked through partnerships to access
18 Scientific Computing World Summer 2022
“As our team and operations have scaled, we started looking to secure our own labs in order to support our growing portfolio of disease projects and to expand the proprietary data types we use in our AI platform”
the experimental systems we require for our preclinical and clinical programmes, but, as our team and operations have scaled, we started looking to secure our own labs in order to support our growing portfolio of disease projects and to expand the proprietary data types we use in our AI platform. ‘The Chesterford Research Park facility is ideal for us and will play a pivotal role in our vision for the next generation of drug discovery for rare diseases. The modern, purpose-built lab has the flexibility to support our scientific and technical ambitions and the location - close to our Cambridge headquarters and enable us to expand our team with experienced local talent. Importantly, the Park Management staff have been very supportive in enabling a speedy acquisition, and we are looking forward to getting up and running in the space,’ Thompson continued. The fully fitted, high-quality suites are
served by high-speed data connectivity, a dedicated external plant area and Cat 6 cabling. These ready-made labs include demountable benching, an open plan write-up area, plus a self-contained single office which means that Healx can ‘plug and play’ without needing to initiate an extensive fit-out. Focused on finding novel treatments
for patients with rare diseases, Healx is deeply passionate about the application of AI to improve access to treatment and the new lab will allow the Healx team to accelerate the discovery and validation of potential new therapies for a range of rarer conditions. Julian Cobourne, head of regional
offices, Aviva Investors, joint owners of Chesterford Research Park with Uttlesford District Council commented: ‘We are thrilled to provide space for a new breed of healthcare technology companies, like Healx, to grow amongst our existing community of cutting-edge, global life science companies. With its new lab space in the Park’s innovative community, Healx will be able to continue its crucial research, rapid expansion and recruitment.’ Chesterford Research Park provides a superb environment for innovative research and development for both established and early-stage biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies and is home to life science and technology innovators including Arecor, AstraZeneca, Cambridge Epigenetix, Charles River Laboratories, Domainex, Illumina and Lonza.
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