Excluding animals from the development of innovative medicines is an expanding aim for society, as well as the pharmaceutical industry. Solvias is delighted to have been selected to play a key role in a new EU-funded project designed to reduce animal testing in pharma.
InPharma is the first European Industrial Doctorate (EID) project whose aim is to replace animal testing by improving computational and bio-predictive in vitro tools to ensure the safety and efficacy of new medicines. The project is designed to take a fully integrated, animal-free, end-to-end modelling approach for the formulation of drugs for oral administration.
Our expert Rolf Hilfiker, PhD, will lead a sub-project focused on finding the optimal co-crystal formulation to improve a new drug’s properties and reduce the need for animal testing later in the development process. Dr Hilfiker is head of Solid-State Development at Solvias and an acknowledged expert in the field who has published several reference works on the topic of crystal structures and solid-form drug development.
InPharma provides funding for a doctoral student who will join the research team at Solvias for the first 1.5 years and subsequently complete his or her thesis over an additional 1.5 years at the University of Southern Denmark in Odense. A total of 13 early-stage research (ESR) students will participate in projects across the InPharma network in partnership with world-class academic research institutions and industry partners.
While working towards eliminating animals from the development of new oral drug formulations, the project aims to help bridge the qualification gap by providing training in novel computational and laboratory-based technologies to prepare tomorrow’s pharmaceutical researchers.
For more information, please fill out the enquiry form attached to this page.