The Affinomics consortium comprised 5 academic groups and 5 commercial enterprises (4 SMEs), with coordination by Babraham Bioscience Technologies Ltd (Cambridge, UK). The academic partners were all also part of ProteomeBinders, as were BBT and SomaLogic. Researchers who were involved in the project are introduced below.
Babraham Bioscience Technologies Ltd (BBT)
Dr Mike Taussig is Head of the Protein Technology Group. His research experience includes the structure of antibodies, protein display libraries and selection, protein array design, cell-free expression systems and X-ray crystallography. He is the co-inventor of ribosome display technology and the PISA and DAPA methods for the production of protein arrays to be used in this project.
Dr Mingyue He is a senior scientist in the group and is co-inventor of the ribosome display and protein array technologies, with particular expertise in the molecular biology of cell-free systems and antibody engineering. Dr Oda Stoevesandt is a post-doctoral scientist, focussing on microarray technology and assay development for parallelised detection of protein-protein interactions. In the framework of AffinityProteome, she is developing the novel DNA array to Protein Array technology (DAPA) into a commercial system.
Biaffin GmBH & Co KG (BIAFFIN)
Dr Bastian Zimmermann, the CEO, is a chemist and co-founder of Baffin. His scientific expertise is in biomolecular interaction analyses and protein kinases. Dr Stephan Drewianka is a chemist with expertise in vitro protein kinase characterisation and protein-protein interactions. Dr Oliver Diekmann is also a chemist, with expertise in Biacore applications and drug-target interactions. Dipl.-Biol. Melanie Kaufholz has specialised in molecular biology and in the framework of AffinityProteome is expressing protein targets for the MAPK pathway.
Source BioScience plc / Geneservice (SBS)
Dr Cliff Murray, Research and Development Manager at Geneservice (part of the Source BioScience plc. group), was previously Reader in Oncology, Nottingham University, and Director CRUK Tumour Cytokine Group. Dr Tom Burr is Research and Development Scientist at Source Bioscience plc.
He carried out post-doctoral work on molecular genetics and cell signalling at the University of Cambridge (Dept of Biochemistry) and Harvard University (Harvard Medical School). Dr Andy Walker is a commercial development manager. He carried out post-doctoral work in the Dept of Genetics at the University of Cambridge.
Olink Bioscience AB (OLINK)
Dr Mats Gullberg, a co-founder of OLINK Bioscience, has focused his research on the development of novel affinity-based technologies for protein detection (proximity ligation, and rolling circle replication). He led a commissioned research project at Uppsala University before joining OLINK AB in late 2005. He is an author of 15 scientific publications and two patent applications.
SomaLogic, Inc. (SOMA)
Dr Larry Gold is the founder, chairman of the board, and chief science officer of SomaLogic. Prior to SomaLogic, he also founded NeXagen, Inc., which later became NeXstar Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Since 1970, Dr Gold has also been a professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder (CU) and served as the chairman of the Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology Department from 1988 to 1992.
In the late 1980s, Gold and Tuerk discovered nucleic acid aptamers while at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Dr Gold has received many citations including the NIH Merit Award, the Career Development Award, and the Chiron Prize for Biotechnology. In addition, Dr Gold has been a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1993 and the National Academy of Sciences since 1995.
German Cancer Research Centre (DKFZ)
Dr Jörg D. Hoheisel is head of the Division of Functional Genome Analysis, which aims to develop and apply new technologies for a description of cellular function from genetic information and the understanding of the regulation of the relevant processes.
He is a leading expert in methods for functional genomics, particularly microarray technologies. Dr Anette Jacob is a chemist involved in highly parallel synthesis procedures and subsequent detection processes. Dipl. Mol. Biotech. Christoph Schröder is a molecular biologist, experienced in analyses on protein microarrays.
Technical University Braunschweig (TUBS)
Professor Stefan Dübel, The Head of the Biotechnology Division, is a co-inventor of antibody phage display and random CDR antibody libraries. He has 18 years of experience with antibody selection in vitro by phage display and initiated and coordinates the Antibody Factory (http://www.antibody-factory.de), a systematic method platform funded by the German National Genome Research Network. Dr Michael Hust is an experienced senior scientist of the ongoing antibody engineering programmes. Dr. Manuela Schüngel coordinates the intrabody team.
Kassel University (UNIKASSEL)
Prof. Dr Friedrich Herberg is Director of the Institute of Biology and Head of the Biochemistry department. A leading expert in biomolecular interaction analysis (BIA), Prof Herberg leads a group of about 15. In 2000, he co-founded the biotech company Baffin (partner 2). He has participated in several EU networks in the development and application of BIA for the kinetic characterisation of signalling complexes with a focus on protein kinases. He has been working on kinase signalling for 15 years and has recently established a proteomics platform in Kassel.
Dr Daniela Bertinetti is a post-doctoral scientist with expertise in Biacore, fluorescence polarisation, assay miniaturisation including microarrays and solid-phase enzymatic assays. Dr Anke Prinz is a senior postdoc with considerable experience in the use of in-cell assays for the detection of protein interactions. Oliver Bertinetti is a senior technician running the mass spec facility.
Uppsala University (UU)
Professor Ulf Landegren is a Professor of Molecular Medicine and the inventor of proximity ligation technology. He coordinated the EU FP6 IP MolTools, aimed at developing a series of new molecular analytical procedures. He has published more than 120 scientific publications and is the inventor of 22 patents and patent applications. Dr Ola Söderberg is a tumour biologist and developed the in situ proximity ligation method. He is interested in protein-protein and protein-DNA interaction studies in a tumour biology context.
Zürich University (UZH)
Professor Andreas Plückthun’s group has made numerous seminal contributions to the field of antibody engineering over the last 20 years, beginning with expression technology, biophysical characterisation and stabilisation, to the development of a synthetic antibody library. His group has pioneered several revolutionary technologies such as ribosome display.
More recently, they developed a new set of binding molecules based on synthetic ankyrin repeat proteins (DARPins), which offer an extraordinary expression yield and thus a realistic prospect to obtain high-affinity binders in a very short time. Professor Plückthun has received numerous awards for his work, is a founder and scientific advisor of the Munich biotech company Morphosys AG, and more recently founded Molecular Partners AG, a company exploiting designed repeat proteins as binders in therapeutic and diagnostic applications.