SeaLife Pharma® and Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) jointly develop the antibiotics of the future
Ecologically produced active ingredients against multi-resistant pathogens: the number of antibiotic-resistant pathogens continues to increase and new antibiotics are required to keep them in check. Promising active ingredients for the production of such antibiotics are the recently rediscovered group known as biaryls. HHU has started an interdisciplinary research project on the environmentally compatible production of biaryls. They occur in nature only in negligible amounts – mainly in moulds – and have not yet been produced in an economically efficient manner.
Austrian SeaLife Pharma® GmbH is one of two companies that will participate in this three-year project, in addition to three working groups at HHU. The project seeks to find a cost-efficient and environmentally compatible way of producing this group of antibiotics by enzymatically coupled semi-synthesis and to make it available for use as medication. SeaLife has already obtained structural patents for the active ingredients and will handle further development. Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt (the German federal environmental foundation) contributes approximately 630,000 euros of the total project budget of 1.5 million euros as part of the ChemBioTec network. The rest of the budget is provided by the project partners.
