GSK joins forces with the University of California to advance genomic research and improve drug discovery

GlaxoSmithKline plc today announced a five-year collaboration with the University of California to establish a state-of-the-art laboratory for CRISPR technologies, the Laboratory for Genomics Research (LGR). The new laboratory will explore how gene mutations cause disease and develop new technologies using CRISPR to rapidly accelerate the discovery of new medicines.

The LGR is the brainchild of Professor Jennifer Doudna, University of California Berkeley (UCB), a co-inventor of CRISPR technology and Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Investigator; Professor Jonathan Weissman, University of California San Francisco (UCSF), a pioneer of CRISPR screening technology and HHMI Investigator; and Dr Hal Barron, Chief Scientific Officer and President, R&D, GSK.

New ‘Laboratory for Genomic Research’ unites CRISPR pioneers with industry expertise to help unravel mysteries of the human genome.

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With the recent explosion of information from human genetics, scientists need powerful tools to understand why small changes in a person’s genetic make-up can increase the risk of diseases, an area of science called functional genomics. The most powerful tool in functional genomics, CRISPR, allows this to be done at a scale once thought impossible. Through this research, scientists can discover and develop novel therapies that have a higher likelihood of becoming medicines ^[1].

Dr Barron said: “Technology is key to our innovation strategy at GSK, and CRISPR is one of the most important technologies of our time. With the expertise of Jennifer and Jonathan helping to steer the LGR, I am confident the lab will significantly advance our scientific understanding of the relationship between genes and disease to help find better medicines faster.”

The LGR represents a novel hybrid model that brings together industrial and academic researchers under a single roof working on projects both together and independently. The outputs of those research projects will be focused on technologies, new drug targets and biological mechanisms that will foster both academic and industrial advances.

The new laboratory will also be a resource for investigators at both University of California (UC) campuses, who can access and use its technology to answer their own biomedical or other biological questions, and to develop new tools that explore how genes work.

Prof Doudna said: “Over the last seven years, CRISPR has transformed academic research, but until the LGR, we haven’t had a focused effort to catalyze the kind of research we know will lead to new innovation using this CRISPR tool. LGR is about building that space where creative science is partnered with the development of robust technology that will help develop tomorrow’s drugs. I think we’re going to be able to do science that none of us can even imagine today.”

The LGR will receive up to $67 million in funding over a five-year period which will include facilities for 24 full-time university employees funded by GSK, plus up to 14 full-time GSK employees. With a focus on immunology, oncology and neuroscience, the laboratory will be based near the UCSF Mission Bay campus in San Francisco. GSK’s artificial intelligence and machine learning group will also be involved in building the necessary computational pipelines to analyze all the data. The LGR aims to automate existing CRISPR approaches so that this work can be done at scale. Ultimately the goal is to deepen our understanding of genetics and discover new targets, and to create next generation technologies that will become future standard practice for the pharmaceutical industry.

Prof Weissman said: “One of our key goals is to advance the field overall and make these tools as broadly available as possible. The LGR screening center will enable labs at UCSF and Berkeley, and having access to it will give our scientists opportunities to advance their research in ways that would be very hard for them to do in their own labs.”

In keeping with UC’s public mission, the tools that are developed in the lab will be described in published papers, subject to intellectual property provisions, and will be available for use by other academic and non-profit labs.

The collaboration will be governed by a Joint Steering Committee with equitable University and GSK representation, with additional joint sub-committees covering patents, scientific and project management. Prof Doudna and Prof Weissman will be members of the Joint Steering Committee, together with GSK’s new head of functional genomics, Dr Chris Miller, who just joined GSK from AbbVie. This builds on the work of the Innovative Genomics Institute (IGI), a separate UC Berkeley/UCSF nonprofit research center co-directed by Prof Doudna and Prof Weissman, whose mission is to use CRISPR to improve public health.

The collaboration will build on GSK’s existing collaborations with companies such as 23andMe, which delivers genetic information at scale. By applying artificial intelligence and machine learning to identify correlations between genetic variants and disease, researchers can select for clinical trials those patients who are most likely to benefit, thereby speeding up the drug development process.

Key milestones in unravelling the mystery of DNA 

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About CRISPR
Scientists use the CRISPR-Cas9 system to make a precise cut in an organism’s DNA. The cell repairs the break in its genome through a sloppy approach that scrambles the DNA sequence or by patching the break with a new piece of DNA designed by the researcher. Scientists can thereby keep a harmful gene from working or add in a helpful sequence.

About GSK 
GSK is a science-led global healthcare company with a special purpose: to help people do more, feel better, live longer. For further information please visit www.gsk.com/about-us/.

About UC Berkeley: The University of California, Berkeley, is the world’s premier public university with a mission to excel in teaching, research and public service. This mission has led to the university’s distinguished record of world-class scholarship, innovation, concern for the betterment of our world, and top rankings for its schools and departments. UC Berkeley is the flagship of the 10-campus University of California system, originally chartered in 1868. Enrolling more than 42,000 undergraduate and graduate students, the campus has more than 1,500 full-time and 500 part-time faculty members in more than 130 academic departments that offer more than 350 degree programs. Twenty-two Nobel Prizes have been awarded to faculty, and 31 Nobels to alumni.

About UCSF: UC San Francisco (UCSF) is a leading university dedicated to promoting health worldwide through advanced biomedical research, graduate-level education in the life sciences and health professions, and excellence in patient care. It includes top-ranked graduate schools of dentistry, medicine, nursing and pharmacy; a graduate division with nationally renowned programs in basic, biomedical, translational and population sciences; and a preeminent biomedical research enterprise. It also includes UCSF Health, which comprises three top-ranked hospitals – UCSF Medical Center and UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals in San Francisco and Oakland – as well as Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital and Clinics, UCSF Benioff Children’s Physicians and the UCSF Faculty Practice. UCSF Health has affiliations with hospitals and health organizations throughout the Bay Area. UCSF faculty also provide all physician care at the public Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center, and the SF VA Medical Center. The UCSF Fresno Medical Education Program is a major branch of the University of California, San Francisco’s School of Medicine. Please visit www.ucsf.edu/news.

Cautionary statements regarding forward-looking statements
GSK cautions investors that any forward-looking statements or projections made by GSK, including those made in this announcement, are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. Such factors include, but are not limited to, those described under Item 3.D Principal risks and uncertainties in the company’s Annual Report on Form 20-F for 2018.

References
[1] Nelson et al (2015) The support of human genetic evidence for approved drug indications https://www.nature.com/articles/ng.3314