NEW YORK, Oct. 22, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- East River BioSolutions announced it has been awarded a $224,566 SBIR Phase I grant from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health ("NIH"). The award will support further development of a fibrotic lung-specific cell culture substrate that will allow scientists to build more physiologically relevant in vitro models of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). IPF is a devastating, intractable, and life-threatening lung disease with over 50,000 new cases diagnosed each year, median survival of only 3–4 years, and annual mortality in the US alone of over 40,000. The only two FDA-approved drugs have limited ability to slow disease progression, and the only definitive treatment for IPF remains lung transplantation, a high-risk intervention hampered by low availability of donor organs, severe complications and high cost to the health care system. Development of effective treatments is hindered because predictive models of IPF for basic research and drug development are not available, leaving a significant need for physiologically relevant experimental in vitro tools that enable quantitative and mechanistic studies of IPF.

East River Bio will fill this gap by providing scientists and companies in need of predictive models with access to a disease-specific native tissue cell culture environment that will enable better in vitro models for the assessment of in vivo performance in the quest for drug discovery and improved treatment options for IPF patients.

Andrea Nye, President and CEO of East River Bio, stated: "Environment matters. Just as the cell microenvironment matters inside the body, it is also vital for the accuracy of results based on cells grown and studied outside the body. The capacity to conduct more biologically faithful research will enable deeper scientific understanding by providing researchers with the ability to increase high-impact discoveries aimed at improving health outcomes. This grant award further confirms market demand for more accurate and predictive in vitro models while also providing external validation for the potential positive impact that our product is likely to have for scientists in need of native cell microenvironments for improved cell culture models."  

About East River BioSolutions.
East River BioSolutions specializes in cell-specific substrates, providing the full, native cell microenvironment essential for the most accurate and actionable results for scientists working in pharmaceutical development, cell biology research and regenerative medicine.

Contact
East River BioSolutions, Inc.
Andrea Nye, CEO
andrea@eastriverbio.com

SOURCE East River BioSolutions