DUBLIN:Irish scientists have discovered a potential treatment for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), a debilitating condition that affects more than 15,000 people in Ireland and millions around the world.
At the moment surgery is often the only option for people suffering from severe IBD, but this could be about to change.
Irish scientists have found that they can almost completely reverse the disease's symptoms using a new class of drugs known as hydroxylase inhibitors.
The principal research scientists involved in the discovery - Prof Cormac Taylor from the UCD Conway Institute, University College Dublin, and Prof Padraic Fallon of the TCD School of Medicine - are now working in collaboration with Dublin-based drug delivery company Sigmoid Biotechnologies, to develop methods of safely delivering these drugs to their intended target area.
They are also collaborating with a research group in the United States that carried out a related study at the University of Colorado Denver, to develop a treatment that can be delivered to humans.
"These findings show that cross-university partnerships adopted by the new generation of Science Foundation Ireland-funded Irish scientists will help to drive Ireland's future knowledge economy," says Prof Fallon.
"If Ireland is to compete at the forefront of scientific discoveries and to develop partnerships with the international biotechnology sector, our scientists must work together in synergy."
The Irish research groups led by Prof Taylor at UCD and Dr Fallon at TCD have recently received independent investigator awards from Science Foundation Ireland totaling over €1 million each.
