A YORK life science firm is hoping to make its mark on the global pharmaceuticals industry by reducing the cost of bringing new drugs to market with its latest technology.

Aptamer Group, based at York Science Park, works to develop synthetic alternatives to antibodies, known as aptamers, for use in life-sciences research.

The company's latest product sees its aptamers put to use to extract drug compounds, known as biomolecules, from natural sources to create biological therapeutics. These are growing in popularity within the natural medicine market as an alternative to synthetically created drugs made from chemicals.

Aptamer Group's new AptaBind service was launched at the International Aptamer Conference in Oxford earlier this month, when the team demonstrated it capabilities in reducing the cost and increasing the efficiency of preparing natural drug compounds for therapeutic use, known as biomolecule purification.

Dr Arron Tolley, chief executive officer at Aptamer Group said: "The development of the AptaBind technology represents a big leap for the company which we hope will benefit biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies globally."

Biological therapeutics have become highly popular in the fight against a range of diseases including cardiovascular disease, cancer and degenerative neurological conditions.

These therapeutic biomolecules are often produced in a variety of cell types, grown in large scale ‘bioreactors’.

While effective, this process means that the molecule of interest must be purified to prevent side effects which may be caused by other molecules in the large scale culture.

Using their proprietary technology, Aptamer Group have developed a unique process to isolate aptamers which function as a purification tool. This has allowed the capture of the biological therapeutic and the exclusion of residual contaminating material.

Most current purification systems require antibodies to isolate the target of interest. Aptamer Group's developers believe that while antibodies have a good degree of success in most cases, they are produced in animals and subsequently in cell culture requiring large scale bioreactors of their own, which they says creates problems in terms of accessibility and consistency.

Dr David Bunka, chief technical officer said: "Unlike antibodies, aptamers are made entirely synthetically with no animal involvement.

"This gives us greater control over their binding properties and also means higher quality in production and importantly helps to reduce the number of animals used in laboratories."

With the launch of the AptaBind service, Aptamer Group is now aiming to partner with companies involved in development of purification reagents, making the technology more widely available.