ParAllele Press Release

PARALLELE BIOSCIENCE AND MERCK COLLABORATE TO DISCOVER GENETIC VARIATIONS IN DRUG TARGETS

Understanding genetic diversity among patients could lead to improved drugs

Under the Merck-funded study, ParAllele will utilize its proprietary Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) discovery and genotyping technologies to discover and characterize common and rare variants among a portfolio of genes identified by Merck. This is the second collaboration between the two companies; a SNP genotyping research project was previously announced in July 2003. Further terms of the collaboration were not disclosed.

"We have been very pleased with ParAllele's performance on our genotyping collaboration and we look forward to applying their SNP discovery capabilities to our research efforts," said Stephen H. Friend, M.D., Ph.D., senior vice president for Molecular Profiling and Basic Cancer Research at Merck Research Laboratories. "Understanding the extent of genetic variation in our drug targets will allow us to develop better and more personalized therapies."

"Merck is a pioneer in applying large-scale genetics to drug discovery and development, and we are excited about this opportunity to broaden our collaborative relationship," said Nick Naclerio, Ph.D., ParAllele's President and CEO. "Targeted SNP discovery is an important element of our comprehensive approach to genetics and provides unique insights into the impact of relatively rare SNPs on common diseases."

ParAllele has developed a suite of powerful single-tube assays for discovering and screening genetic markers, known as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). With ParAllele's proprietary lab-in-a-tube" approach, it is possible to uncover all of the common and rare variants present in a given patient population at a small fraction of the costs associated with conventional resequencing approaches. ParAllele's SNP discovery technologies typically result in three to four times more validated SNPs than are found in public or private databases, thus increasing the comprehensiveness of a given study. Genetic variation among drug targets or genes in a disease pathway can result in variability in disease prognosis, drug response and the incidence of side effects.

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