LEO Science & Tech Hub Announce Imaging Technology Partnership

LEO Science & Tech Hub, an R&D unit of LEO Pharma, has announced two collaborative projects with The Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. The Hub will provide research funding to support development of novel imaging technology with the laboratory led by Conor L. Evans, Ph.D., assistant professor at Harvard Medical School, and a disposable microbiopsy device with Walfre Franco, Ph.D., instructor, and Adam Raff, M.D., Ph.D., clinical associate from R. Rox Anderson’s Lab.

The Evans Lab’s research specializes in microscopy and spectroscopy for understanding cancer and dermatology afflictions. This collaboration will explore novel imaging technologies that will enable noninvasive, high-resolution, real-time pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic (PK/PD) measurements with help of the lab’s coherent Raman scattering (CRS) technology. This technology enables chemically specific imaging by means of detecting specific molecular vibrations native to drugs and tissues.

The Anderson Lab focuses on discovering new optical treatments and diagnostics, mainly for problems in dermatology. This collaboration will seek to develop a painless, suture-free, disposable microbiopsy device that may potentially allow for a nonscarring sampling procedure of full-thickness skin microbiopsies and will enable frequent sampling in clinical studies to help researchers further understand the disease profile.

These collaborative projects come on the heels of two partnerships The Hub announced in June. The first is a two-year collaboration with The Karp Lab at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, aimed at developing minimally invasive technologies for dermal biomarker assessments, and the second collaboration is an investment in Novopyxis, a Cambridge, Mass.-based biotech company developing a needle-free aerosol-based drug delivery device used for topical skin treatments.