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I²R Ties Up With French Counterparts to Develop Innovative Healthcare Tools

The Institute for Infocomm Research (I²R), a research institute of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), has entered into the second phase of a research and development (R&D) agreement with Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Université Joseph Fourier (UJF) and the National University of Singapore (NUS) for their joint laboratory in Singapore known as the Image, Pervasive Access Lab, or IPAL. This next phase also marks the addition of Université Pierre et Marie Curie (a.k.a. University of Paris 6) and Institut Telecom as new parties to the agreement.

IPAL opens a window for French

scientists and engineers to understand the dynamic and vibrant research culture and operations in a high-growth South-East Asia economy such as Singapore and to bridge to other South-East Asian nations. This, in turn, creates tremendous opportunities for both countries in the development of intellectual property related to infocomm, media and engineering in the form of high-quality international publications, innovative research prototypes, copyrights and patents.

A signing ceremony was held on 8 February 2011 to formalise the partnership. Under the agreement, I²R will work with their collaborators in the areas of Medical Image Understanding (MIU) and Pervasive Access & Wellbeing Management (PAWM). (More details below). These are leading edge infocomm technologies, which once developed, will benefit the healthcare industry in Singapore and France.

The Medical Image Understanding (MIU) research

The MIU team aims to develop technologies and tools for discovering meaningful biomedical knowledge from visual data by interactive visualization, ontological description, and statistical modeling. These computer-assisted observations will help biologists and clinicians understand biological processes or pathologies in a more integrated way, and even at the genetic level, hence improving the decision making process in medical prognosis and treatment.

In the next three years, the MIU team will collaborate with THALES, AGFA Healthcare, Hopital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière, Tribvn, and the LIP6 laboratory (Université Pierre et Marie Curie), to develop a

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breast cancer grading system under the French ANR-funded TecSan programme.

The Pervasive Access & Wellbeing Management (PAWM) research

The elderly with deteriorating physical and mental functions, while desiring to keep their independence and safety, find it a challenge to remain connected to the community. Ambient assisted living (AAL) technology holds much promise to help increase the autonomy in daily activities of older people. The research projects under PAWM focus on human-environment multi-modal interaction modeling and system reasoning with ambient intelligence to enrich user’s experiences.

The PAWM team is working closely with Alexandra Hospital and Peacehaven Nursing Home to design a strong reasoning engine and develop context-aware service-oriented AAL platform for elderly with mild dementia at home in the next two years, funded by the A*STAR Home2015 research program.

Mr. Olivier Caron (Ambassador of France to Singapore) said, “IPAL is one of the first Scientific joint laboratories created between France and Singapore. It was created in the same time and same location comprising CNRS (French National Center of Scientific Research), I²R (Institute for Infocomm Research - A*STAR), UJF (Joseph Fourier University in Grenoble) and NUS (National University of Singapore) to conduct research in imagery technologies. It has been the starting point of different other agreements

and joint labs who have benefited from the reputation and experience gained by IPAL. The two new partners (Université Pierre et Marie Curie and Institut Telecom) are among the most reputable academic institutions in France which testifies to the success and the importance of IPAL in the scientific landscape.”

Prof Lye Kin Mun, Executive Director, I²R commented: ‘I²R is extremely pleased to extend the successful collaboration that we have had with our French and Singaporean partners for another four years. The quality and value of IPAL has been clearly demonstrated by its ability to secure over SGD$5million in research funds from both France and Singapore for various projects. In the second phase, we are happy to welcome two new French partners, Université Pierre et Marie Curie and Institut Telecom to the programme. IPAL will continue to focus on important global challenges such as essential healthcare solutions for the world population.’

Key Enterovirus Breakthrough in Taiwan

A Taiwanese medical team unveiled on Friday the mechanism by which enterovirus 71 (EV-71) develops into a disease, the first step in developing an effective cure for diseases caused by various enteroviral infections, the researchers said.

Ten to 20 percent of patients in Taiwan with severe EV-71 die every year, but there is still no effective treatment due to a lack of knowledge about the viral infection process, said Yu Sung-liang, an

associate professor in National Taiwan University’s Department of Clinical and Laboratory Sciences and Medical Biotechnology.

After three years of research, Yu and his team, which is composed of specialists from various fields, found that microRNA-141 was the key in regulating EV-71, a breakthrough in the understanding of the -enteroviral infection model.

RNA, or ribonucleic acid, is found throughout cells and governs the manufacture of proteins.

The finding was published in Cell Host & Microbe, a popular journal in the field of medical biology on Thursday.

“Viruses are very smart,” said Yang Pan-chyr, the dean of National Taiwan University’s College of Medicine, explaining that viruses invade the host through -different mechanisms or routes, most of which

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are unknown at present.“Through th i s s tudy, we

know that EV-71 takes over the human body by first manipulating -microRNA-141, which controls more than 100 genes that produce useful proteins,” he said.

According to Yang, s ince different species of enteroviruses, such as Coxsackievirus and Poliovirus, adopt the same pattern as EV-71 in attempting to shut off human body functions, the finding should be helpful in developing a cure for all types of entroviral infections.

The next step would be to -develop an anti-microRNA-141 drug to be tested on animals and humans already infected with EV-71, said Yang, who hoped that a remedy could be developed within two years.

EV-71 infection can result in different and potentially deadly s y m p t o m s, s u c h a s a s e p t i c meningitis, paralysis, myocarditis and cardiopulmonary failure. Taiwan’s first outbreak of EV-71 was in 1998, leaving 78 patients dead. The virus can be found in many East Asian countries, such as Taiwan, China, Malaysia and South Korea.

Potential Treatment for Chikungunya

The Singapore Immunology Network (SIgN), an institute of the Agency of Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), and VIVALIS (NYSE Euronext: VLS), a French b iopharmaceut ica l company, announced today the discovery of two new fully human monoclonal antibodies which could battle Chikungunya, a disease that currently has no available vaccine or specific treatment. The international

team of scientists, coordinated by Dr Lucile Warter of SIgN, has published their groundbreaking discovery in the Journal of Immunology.

Chikungunya is prevalent in Africa, South Asia, and South-East Asia and is transmitted by the Aedes mosquito, the same mosquito that spreads dengue fever. In Singapore alone, over 1000 Chikungunya cases were reported over the period 2008-2010. Dr Warter and her collaborators used Humalex®, a VIVALIS technology platform designed to identify and generate fully human monoclonal antibodies, to develop two antibodies that could neutralize several Chikungunya strains in vitro by culturing immune cells from an individual who had developed resistance to Chikungunya. Monoclonal antibodies can be more potent and have fewer side effects than conventional small molecule drugs.

“The d i scovery o f these antibodies is a big step forward in combating a disease that presently has no available vaccine or specific treatment. The use of VIVALIS’ Humalex® was invaluable in helping us isolate the target antibodies from the cultured immune cells.

We hope to further validate the use of these antibodies as a viable treatment for Chikungunya.” said Dr Warter. She added that further testing in vivo would have to be carried out to validate the antibodies’ performance as a potential treatment for Chikungunya.

“It is thanks to the successful synergy between industry and SIgN that the development of two antibodies against a disease that is on the rise has been accomplished. The combination of Humalex® technology, SIgN’s expertise in human immunology, virology and molecular biology, and Singapore’s location as a hub for Asia helped to speed up the selection, sequencing and characterization of the most potent ant ibody candidates. I am delighted to note that this breakthrough was achieved in less than a year from the start of the project”, said SIgN Chairman Prof Philippe Kourilsky.

“The new platform used by SIgN for the generation of fully human monoclonal antibody is already providing excellent results, and we hope to generate a number of new fully human monoclonal antibodies that could be used as therapeutics,”

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said SIgN Scientific Director Prof. Paola Castagnoli.

“The discovery of these new fully human monoclonal antibodies with strong neutralizing activities against the Chikungunya virus constitutes an an additional testimony of the efficiency of the Humalex® platform. Coming shortly after the signature of a major commercial agreement with sanofi Pasteur, the vaccine division of Sanofi Aventis, this discovery is a further validation of the power of VIVALIS Humalex® antibody discovery platform. It is a first milestone in our research partnership with SIgN and we expect to benefit from the excellent scientific input from SIgN scientists in the field of immunology in future collaborative programs”, commented Franck Grimaud, CEO, and Majid Mehtali, CSO, co-managers of VIVALIS.

Contending with the Financial Risks of REDD+

REDD+ (short for “Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation”), a key strategic initiative of the United Nations (UN) to reform global conservation finance, could be more effective with wiser planning. Believing so, PhD student Mr Jacob Phelps and Asst Prof Edward Webb from the NUS Department of Biological Sciences, together with Dr Koh Lian Pin from ETH Zurich, set forth to outline the financial risks and ways to improve the financial resilience of forest conservation projects linked to REDD+, in a paper published in Conservation Letters on 21 December 2010.

Said Mr Phelps, first author of the study: “With prudent planning, REDD+ can contribute not only to reducing emissions, but also to protecting biodiversity. However, it remains highly uncertain if REDD+ funding will fuel long-term biodiversity conservation. We need to acknowledge the related risks to better prepare governments, conservationists and landowners to deal with the incoming, but by no means reliable or permanent, investments in forests.”

REDD+ involves the use of market or financial incentives to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases from forested lands. Beyond that, it also encompasses conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks.

In contrast to high expectations

for funding of REDD+ projects, the study highlighted the risk of relying on voluntary public funding, which remain uncertain and potentially unsustainable in the long-term. It also raised concern over insufficient private investments in REDD+ projects, and the mismatch between the investment horizon for REDD+ projects versus the need for long-term funding to protect endangered species.

To improve risk management for biodiversity conservation, the researchers proposed several mit igat ing strategies such as diversifying conservation finance, stipulating minimum contributions from top carbon-emitting countries, managing REDD+ funding through conservation trust funds, and restraining the scale of REDD+ projects to what is achievable in the long-term.

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