Building small pyramids

Building small pyramids

By Mike Ward Senior Editor

Big pharma's willingness to pay up for preclinical approaches to hot targets was again confirmed last week when Johnson & Johnson's Janssen Pharmaceutica N.V. unit established a drug discovery alliance with Astex Therapeutics Ltd. to develop inhibitors of fibroblast growth factor receptor and two other cancer targets selected by Janssen.

FGF receptor is a receptor tyrosine kinase that activates MAP kinase and the protein kinase B/Akt pathways. It has been linked to many diseases including multiple myeloma (MM) and breast, prostate, colon and bladder cancers. FGF receptor signaling has been linked to angiogenesis, which may