DEPD®, A HIGH RESOLUTION GENE EXPRESSION PROFILING TECHNIQUE CAPABLE OF IDENTIFYING NEW DRUG TARGETS IN THE CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM

ABSTRACT

Digital expression pattern display (DEPD®) is an open, automated, PCR-based system of gene expression profiling that is capable of resolving as many as 100,000 transcripts from a single brain tissue cDNA sample. It has a detection sensitivity of better than 1 in 750,000 and it can reliably detect differences in RNA expression levels of less than two-fold. Digital expression pattern display presently is the most sensitive and therefore the only expression profiling method available that is capable of monitoring, in a semi-quantitative fashion, the expression of even the rarest of transcripts found in human brain tissue. Biofrontera applies this proprietary technique, together with state-of-the-art bioinformatics, for the purposes of elucidating pathology pathways of major brain diseases, of analysing the target profiles of drugs presently applied or in development, and of identifying novel targets for drug action.

Key Words: :

• Gene expression
• Transcription profiling
• PCR
• DEPD®