Velcura Therapeutics, Inc. has received a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant for $274,000 from the National Institute on Aging (NIA) to further identify the genes and or protein networks modulated during human bone formation. SBIR is a competitively awarded, three-phase Federal Government program designed to stimulate technological innovation and provide opportunities for small business.

Velcura was the first corporation to grow human bone in tissue culture and has multiple patents on this process. The Michigan-based company uses its platform bone-growth technologies to discover and optimize drugs stimulating bone formation for use in treating diseases such as Osteoporosis. Velcura’s first drug, VEL-0230, is scheduled to begin human clinical trials in late 2007.

"This NIA grant allows us to significantly advance our understanding of how genes and their protein-products work together inside a cell to bring about bone formation," said Velcura’s President and CEO Michael W. Long, Ph.D. "Velcura’s scientific team had identified about 1,200 genes involved in this process by 2004." Dr. Long explained. "Yet, only knowing the names of these key genes without understanding their functional interactions, just makes us hit the wall faster," he added. "To succeed in fighting Osteoporosis and other diseases, we have to understand how these genes work together and which ones are crucial to the bone formation process."

This is Velcura’s third NIA SBIR award that funds the initial phases of this ground-breaking gene-networks study. When the study is completed, the company plans to apply to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for a Phase II SBIR that will help translate these mechanisms of action studies into a commercial endeavor.

About Velcura Therapeutics®, Inc.

Focused on developing drugs that stimulate bone formation, Velcura Therapeutics®, Inc. uses adult stem cells to grow human bone in tissue culture and then analyzes this process to develop novel therapies for osteoporosis and other bone diseases. Based in Ann Arbor, Mich., the U.S. biotechnology company received $3.3 million in funding from the Michigan Life Sciences Corridor in 2002 and more than $3.8 million from the National Institutes of Health. A spin-off of the University of Michigan, Velcura Therapeutics has a exclusive license agreement with a Japanese pharmaceutical company, Nippon Chemiphar Co., Ltd. and in 2007 they plan to begin human clinical trials of a new drug the two companies have found to be effective in animal models of osteoporosis.