The following resources are available to members of the Saint Louis University Institute for Drug and Biotherapeutic Innovation and other members of the SLU campus community.
These resources include information on the IDBI Seed Grant, the ADME/PK Service, assays available within member labs, Computational Chemistry (CDD Vault, Schrödinger Suite, Computational Workstation), and access to the IDBI Shared Drive. Some resources are also available to external academic and non-academic users.
The IDBI Innovation Seed Grant aims to provide funds to promote small projects likely to result in expansion of IDBI collaborations and acquisition of external funding. These funds are intended to support specific experiments focused tightly toward improving funding chances of an external drug/biotherapeutic discovery-development- or delivery-related grant application(s) intended to be submitted within 12 months from seed grant submission.
Eligibility
Any IDBI senior member employed by SLU. Non-SLU employees may be co-investigators but not PIs on an IDBI seed grant. One application per PI is permitted per review cycle, and IDBI members can be PI on only one funded application at a time. Members may be co-investigators on more than one application per cycle, and they can serve as co-investigators on more than one funded seed grant at a time.
Funding Limits and Term
Award amounts are flexible but should not exceed $10,000 except in rare and very well-justified cases; most awards will be for less than this amount. Funds may be spent on supplies, professional services, equipment, technician salaries, and student stipends or hourly pay. They may not be used to support travel or faculty salary. Funds must be used within nine months of the award (12 months for projects requiring new animal or human subjects approvals). Only very well-justified extensions will be granted.
Submission Deadlines
The last day of January, April, July and October annually.
IDBI Seed Grant Documents
The IDBI Discovery Services Laboratory provides expertise and key assays to help researchers determine how a drug is absorbed (A), distributed to tissues (D), metabolized (M), and excreted (E). These pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters must be investigated during drug development.
Associate Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Fran Sverdrup, Ph.D, directs the Discovery Services Laboratory. Laboratory scientists perform assays and bioanalytical analyses, and Senior Analytical Chemist Abdul Mottaleb, Ph.D., provides LC/MS services.
The Discovery Services Laboratory provides expert pharmacology-related consultations and wet bench support. The laboratory can also provide connections to external service providers who have signed MSAs with Saint Louis University to expedite contract agreements on assays unavailable within the lab. IDBI members can access the listing of MSAs here. Consultation with laboratory staff is encouraged to select appropriate assays and determine whether experiments should be performed internally or by an outside provider.
Wet bench support includes:
- In Vitro ADME Assays
- Plasma Protein Binding – Measures the extent to which a drug in plasma is free (unbound) and available to interact with its target and metabolizing enzymes
- Microsomal Stability – Measures intrinsic (Phase 1; P450) metabolism in purified liver or intestinal microsomes (available in mouse, rat, human, etc.)
- Hepatocyte Stability – Measures combined Phase 1 and Phase 2 metabolism (available in mouse, rat, human, etc)
- PAMPA – Measures passive diffusion through artificial membranes. Configurable to mimic membrane composition for various cells and tissues
- CACO2 Permeability – Measures permeability across an intestinal cell layer to predict the efficiency of oral absorption and the potential for efflux
- MDR (PGP) Transport – Measures potential for drug efflux via the Major Drug Transporter
- In Vivo Mouse PK Studies
- Can assess standard PK parameters (e.g., half-life) by any of multiple administration pathways
- PK & PK/PD Modeling
- Modeling of the effects of different dose levels and of repeated doses at various intervals on target activity and therapeutic efficacy
Assays within the lab are low-cost for IDBI members (grant effort or fee-based).
Parties interested in working with the IDBI Discovery Services Laboratory should contact Director Fran Sverdrup at fran.sverdrup@health.slu.edu.
Most ADME/PK assays and mouse PK studies utilize tandem liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS) for quantitation of compound concentrations in experimental samples. The Discovery Services Laboratory has developed standardized rates for this bioanalytical analysis.
LC/MS Service is available to internal and external users, including industry. LC/MS service can be supported by fee-for-service or grant effort. Contact Fran Sverdrup, director of IDBI Discovery Services Laboratory, to discuss using the LC/MS service at fran.sverdrup@health.slu.edu.
1.0 Rules: Prior to initiating projects, users are required to discuss with Laboratory staff the design of experiments and expected outcomes to allow Laboratory staff to provide an estimate of project costs.
1.1 Service Access: Service is available to all researchers within SLU. External non-profit institutions and external for-profit entities may also be approved to use Laboratory services. For external users, a business contract will need to be initiated and reviewed through the University contracting process.
1.2 Equipment Access: Access to laboratory equipment is not available on a stand-alone basis. Exceptions to this may be made at the sole discretion of the Laboratory Director in consultation with Laboratory Staff. Exceptions to this rule may only be granted to IDBI members.
2.0 Priority: Initiation of projects will be prioritized as follows:
- Grant-funded projects with effort support assigned to laboratory personnel.
- Projects initiated by IDBI PIs as part of a successful IDBI Seed Grant award.
- Projects initiated by IDBI PIs
- Projects initiated by non-IDBI SLU PIs and other academics
- For-profit entities
Given constraints on Laboratory staff time, it is possible that not all projects will be taken on. Laboratory staff will work with project PIs to initiate and complete projects in a timely manner.
3.0 LC/MS Rates: LC/MS Service Rates and Fees have been designed to ensure the continued operability of the service, while providing significant value to IDBI members, SLU investigators, and other Discovery Services Laboratory users. Rates have been determined by direct material and labor costs for sample and processing. SLU provides significant subsidized direct and indirect support for the operation of the ADME/PK facility for SLU users, as such, outside user rates include administrative, equipment, and facility charges necessary to provide this service to non-SLU researchers.
Prior to initiating projects, users are required to meet with Discovery Services Laboratory staff to discuss the scope and design of the project to ensure estimated costs are accurate. Funding by grant-derived effort will be calculated independently. The Discovery Services Laboratory Director, staff, IDBI Leadership, and IDBI directors are not responsible for over- or under-estimation of actual costs incurred, and these costs will be billed for recovery.
| IDBI Member | SLU Investigator | Not-For Profit Researcher | For-Profit Researcher | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Per Sample Rate* | $16 | $16 | $20 | $48 |
| Additional Processing per sample (e..g tissue homogenization) | $5 (min $100) |
$5 (min $100) |
$7 (min $100) |
$10 (min $100) |
| Additional Labor & Analysis per hour (bioanalytical) | $74 | $74 | $94 | $140 |
| Additional Labor & Analysis per hour (assays, animal) | $74 | $74 | $94 | $140 |
| Consultation / Management (with Director) | Free | 1 hour free | $135/hour | $250/hour |
| Minimum Total Charge | $750 | $750 | $900 | $2,000 |
* Per Sample rate includes standard processing (organic extraction), and documentation.
* Per Sample rate is for samples ready for organic extraction, additional sample processing.
** Research rate is applied to methods development for unknown or novel compounds; Raw
data analysis; interpretation and reporting.
*** Discovery Services Laboratory Director Support for Data Review, meeting or communication
will incur additional charges
# Non-academic contracts will include a minimum 1 hour management charge
4.0 Other Assay Rates: Rates for other in vitro and in vivo assays have not been standardized. Variations in experiment design, length, materials, and laboratory staff involvement necessitate these projects being cost estimated independently. Larger research projects incorporating LC/MS services will not be subject to the minimum LC/MS charges stated in section 3.0.
CDD Vault
The IDBI provides access to CDD Vault as a service to its members. CDD Vault is an industry-leading database for securely organizing, sharing and archiving data related to compound collections and the chemical and biological assays used to describe them. SLU's major physical compound libraries are already pre-loaded into CDD Vault (these are custom libraries maintained by Marv Meyers, John Walker and John Tavis, plus the various commercial screening libraries SLU owns). CDD Vault provides a centralized location to house data on your compounds and the data gathered by your team. The platform also promotes security and confidentiality; only designated team members can view, edit, import, or export data within your projects.
For more information on CDD Vault, contact Marvin Meyers (marvin.j.meyers@slu.edu).
Schrödinger Molecular Modeling Suite
IDBI facilitates the bundling of licensure for the Schrödinger Modeling Suite for small molecule and biologics discovery, securing the software at a discount for members and providing a license for infrequent users of these tools.
IDBI has licensed components of Schrödinger allowing for complete small-molecule drug discovery, as well as for modeling and design of biologics. The software modules provide comprehensive solutions to molecular modeling and small molecule drug discovery/design, macromolecule structure analysis and prediction, molecular dynamics simulation, and protein-protein/protein-biomolecule docking. Users can take a known (or predicted) protein structure, predict compound (chemical or biological) binding sites and poses, virtually screen compounds, and perform iterative design optimization of target molecules. Users can also take static drug/protein interactions a step further with molecular dynamic simulations.
The software can be run on any computer (except for computationally heavy processes). IDBI runs the Schrödinger suite on a high-performance computational workstation housed in Monsanto Hall to support computationally intensive processes. Both physical and remote access to the high-performance workstation is possible.
For more information on access and use, contact Marvin Meyers (marvin.j.meyers@slu.edu).
Numerous assays developed within individual IDBI member laboratories are available for collaborative studies. The listing of these assays is intended as a resource for IDBI members and SLU researchers to identify local resources for expertise and collaboration. IDBI members may also be willing to make these assays available to non-SLU Investigators and institutions. Inquiries can be made to drugdiscovery@slu.edu.
The IDBI maintains for its members a shared drive to distribute relevant partnering and funding opportunities, lists of vendors (including those with NDAs and/or MSAs with the University that may be valuable to drug discovery and development research), as well as internal archives of documents.
Access to this drive is designated for IDBI members only. You will need to sign in using your University account. You may also need to be added as a user to the shared drive. If you are an IDBI member and do not have access, contact Jaffre Athman at jaffre.athman@slu.edu to be added to the user list. If you are not an IDBI member and would like to become an IDBI member and gain access to the shared drive, contact John Tavis at john.tavis@health.slu.edu.
The IDBI distributes a biweekly newsletter (every other Friday), the IDBI Elixir, with curated news from IDBI members, announcements from the IDBI and the University, webinars, seminars, and educational opportunities related to drug and biotherapeutic discovery and development, and federal, foundation, and corporate grant and research partnering opportunities.
Content for the Elixir can be sent to Jaffre Athman (jaffre.athman@slu.edu).