TheraLogics, a company spun out of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has received a two-year, $800,000 federal grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to study treatments for a common side effect of bone marrow and cord blood transplants.
The grant is part of the NIH Small Business Technology Transfer program, which supports cooperative research projects between small business and universities.
UNC professor Jonathan Serody, co-leader of the immunology program at UNC's Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, won the award in collaboration with four-year-old TheraLogics.
TheraLogics researches a protein known as NF-kappa B in the treatment of cancer and muscular dystrophy. The will allow the company to study the protein in the treatment of graft versus host disease - a complication of bone marrow and cord blood transplants in which a patient's immune system attacks the body.
Dr. Albert Baldwin, a Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, formed Theralogics in 2004 to provide a focused vehicle for the discovery and development of NF-kappa B-related discoveries and technologies. Serody will perform his work along with Baldwin, as well a handful of other UNC professors and outside researchers.