UK-US boost for cancer research via SPT Labtech and BellBrook Labs
The companies have developed a miniaturised, high-throughput screening platform for the discovery and profiling of Vacuolar protein sorting associated protein 4B (VPS4B) ATPase inhibitors, addressing a critical bottleneck in early-stage oncology drug discovery.
VPS4B has emerged as a high-priority therapeutic target in oncology due to its overexpression in specific tumours and its synthetic-lethal relationship with its paralog, VPS4A, but despite its potential, the industry has so far lacked robust, scalable screening approaches to identify effective inhibitors.
The new platform addresses this challenge by combining BellBrook Labs’ Transcreener® ADP2 fluorescence polarisation assay with SPT Labtech’s dragonfly® discovery system.
The Transcreener assay enables direct, homogeneous detection of ADP with high sensitivity, while SPT Labtech’s dragonfly discovery system for automated reagent dispensing offers a precise and scalable solution.
The combined solution is capable of operating in 384- and 1536-well formats, improving data quality over manual approaches, while significantly minimising reagent consumption and cost. High-throughput screening on this platform enabled identification of 13 novel VPS4B inhibitors, which can be further evaluated using SPT Labtech’s mosquito® liquid handling platform for rapid, robust follow-up testing.
Justin Brink, President of Maryland-based BellBrook Labs, said: "Our collaboration with SPT Labtech is a response to the industry’s need for smarter, more resource-efficient drug discovery.
“Through a combination of our Transcreener technology with the precision of the dragonfly discovery platform, we have significantly lowered the barriers to VPS4B screening, allowing researchers to dramatically reduce reagent consumption while maintaining the high Z' values and data sensitivity required for reliable hit identification. It’s a game-changer for any biotech or pharma team targeting these complex ATPases."
Joby Jenkins, Chief Technology Officer at SPT Labtech, commented: "Building on 25 years of positive displacement technology, we are supporting our customers to achieve faster, more efficient liquid handling, laying the foundation for the next generation of laboratory automation.
“Our latest collaboration with BellBrook Labs demonstrates the power of combining industry-leading assay chemistry with world-class liquid handling. By miniaturising the VPS4B assay without compromising data quality we are providing Pharma and Biotech companies with a truly scalable path toward new cancer therapeutics.”