M E M B E R   P R O F I L E

Sygnis Bioscience GmbH & Co.KG
Sygnis has 43 employees and is focused on drug discovery for neurodegenerative diseases, and technological developments mostly in the area of transcription profiling. Sygnis is situated within the campus of the university of Heidelberg, in close vicinity to the clinical departments of neurology and neurosurgery, the department of clinical neurobiology, the department of physiology, and the Max-Planck-Institute for Medical Research (Prof. Seeburg), and has a close network of collaborations with these institutions.

Sygnis is deeply devoted to research-driven development. Sygnis has a long history with transcription profiling in the central nervous system. Techniques available for transcription profiling are a sensitive differential display technique (RMDD), and DNA-array approaches. Expression profiling with complete brain regions from various neurological disease models often led to unsatisfactory results due to the heterogeneity of the cells in the brain. Sygnis employs a novel technology, developed by Axaron, that allows to profile individual cell-types from the CNS (Axaminer) thus focussing on the relevant events. Axaminer consists of four modules, RNA-friendly immunostaining, isolation of cells by laser microdissection technology, amplification of RNA, and array hybridization.

Using transcription profiling, Sygnis predecessor has identified many new interesting targets for the treatment of neurological conditions, and has performed a clinical phase II trial in stroke patients with its compound AX200.

Sygnis has active research ongoing in the areas of adult neural stem cells, and mechanisms of neurodegeneration in cerebral ischemia and Parkinson's disease. Sygnis offers expertise in assessment of neural stem cell differentiation, animal disease models including behavioural measurements, and transcriptional profiling. It is open to visiting scientists from the consortium.

1. Schneider A, Martin-Villalba A, Weih F, Vogel J, Wirth T, Schwaninger M (1999) NF-kB is activated and promotes cell death in focal cerebral ischemia. Nat Med 5:554-559.

2. Schneider A, Fischer A, Spielvogel D, Ahsen Ov, Sigrid Scheek, Krüger C, Rossner M, Klaussner B, Faucheron N, Birgitta Kammandel, Goetz B, Herrmann O, Bach A, Schwaninger M (2004) Restriction-mediated Differential Display (RMDD) Identifies pip92 as a Pro-apoptotic Gene Product Induced During Focal Cerebral Ischemia. J Cereb Blood Flow Metab 24:224-236.

3. Schneider A, Laage R, Ahsen Ov, Fischer A, Rossner M, Scheek S, Grünewald S, Kuner R, Weber D, Krüger C, Klaussner B, Götz B, Hiemisch H, Newrzella D, Martin-Villalba A, Bach A, Schwaninger M (2004) Identification of regulated genes during permanent focal cerebral ischaemia: characterization of the protein kinase 9b5/MARKL1/MARK4. J Neurochem 88:1114-1126.

4. Potrovita I, Zhang W, Burkly L, Hahm K, Lincecum J, Wang M, Maurer M, Rossner M, Schneider A, Schwaninger M (2004) Tumor Necrosis Factor-Like Weak Inducer of Apoptosis-Induced Neurodegeneration. J Neurosci 24, 8237-8244.

5. Maurer M, Grünewald S, Gassler N, Rossner M, Propst F, Würz R, Weber D, Thomas Kuner T, Kuschinsky W, Schneider A (2004) Cloning of a novel neuronally expressed orphan G-protein-coupled receptor which is up-regulated by erythropoietin, interacts with microtubule-associated protein 1b and colocalizes with the 5-hydroxytryptamine 2a receptor. J Neurochem. 91: 1007-1017.

Dr. Alfred Bach,
Managing Director of Sygnis Bioscience, with over 20 years experience in the neuroscience field, and over 10 years experience in pharma industry (BASF), and 7 years experience in Biotech (CEO of Axaron Bioscience and Managing Director of Sygnis Bioscience).

Dr. Oliver Sorgenfrei, Director of Services, over 15 years experience in molecular biology and biochemistry. Heads the Axaminer service group devoted to transcription profiling of single cells or small areas from the CNS.

Dr. Armin Schneider, Vice President of Molecular Neurology, over 13 years experience in neurobiology of disease. Strong background in clinical neurology, molecular biology, neuroanatomy, and animal models.

Selected patents:

Schneider, Armin; Klaussner, Bettina; Fischer, Achim; Newrzella, Dieter; Goetz, Bernhard; Rossner, Moritz; Eisenhardt, Gisela; Kuner, Rohini; Trutzel, Annette; Kammandel, Birgitta; Jomana Naim, Stephanie; Schwaninger, Markus (2000) Neuronal Serine-Threonine Protein Kinase. DE 100 24 171.WO 01/088108. EP 1 282 700.

Schneider, Armin; Maurer, Martin; Kuschinsky, Wolfgang (2001). Ee3-Protein family and corresponding DNA sequences. DE 101 51 511. WO 03/035684.

Schaebitz, Wolf-Ruediger; Schneider, Armin; Krueger, Carola; Sommer, Clemens; Schwab, Stefan; Kollmar, Rainer; Maurer, Martin; Weber, Daniela; Gassler, Nikolaus (2002). Methods of treating neurological conditions with hematopoietic growth factors. US 20040141946.