12 NIJMEGEN-BASED TROPIQ IS A FORERUNNER IN THE FIGHT AGAINST MALARIA TropIQ Health Sciences has been collaborating with HAN BioCentre for many years. The company from Nijmegen plays a central role in the fight against malaria and specializes in research on vaccines, medicines, and repellents. Co-founder Koen Dechering shares insights into their partnership, expertise, and current research on malaria control. His fascination with malaria began 30 years ago with a simple question: how is it possible for a parasite to live in both a human and a mosquito? “Those are two completely different living environments”, says Koen Dechering, Vice President of Business Deve- lopment. “It’s like we as humans being able to live on Earth AND on Mars.” After completing his PhD research at Radboud University and spending a long time developing drugs at pharmaceutical company Organon, he decided 14 years ago to join several others in founding TropIQ. Their goal was to build a bridge between the academic world – where valuable malaria research was being conducted – and pharmaceutical companies and foundations eager to combat the disease. Since then, the company has primarily supported other researchers. “If you look at the portfolio of malaria drugs currently in development worldwide, we’ve contributed to 70 percent of it.” TropIQ specializes in large-scale testing of compounds and vaccines for effectiveness. The focus is no longer just on malaria, but on all diseases transmitted by insects and ticks. “What makes us unique is that, among other things, we grow the malaria parasite ourselves and can mimic the entire life cycle in our lab. This gives us a constant source of high-quality research material and allows us to test compounds at an early stage.” BIOLOGY AND CHEMISTRY TropIQ also initiates its own research projects. This may involve new testing technologies or new molecules for drugs or vaccines. For those in-house projects in particular, TropIQ is working with HAN BioCentre. “We are a biology company, but we operate at the intersection of biology and chemistry. That’s why we have partners in chemistry.” The collaboration came about through Pedro Hermkens, former director of the School of Applied Biosciences and Chemistry, of which HAN BioCentre is a part. Dechering and Hermkens know each other from their time together at Organon. One of the prominent (student) projects at the biocentre, which is still ongoing, focuses on developing new substances that repel mosquitoes and ticks. “We built an AI model that predicts whether a che- mical compound has mosquito repellent properties”, explains Dechering. “We can test that in our lab and then work with HAN’s chemists to improve the molecule. That optimization involves about 50 different parameters. People are good at overseeing that complexity. For students, such projects are also fun. They create a compound and we test it. Students then come here to observe, which makes everything very tangible. In that respect, HAN does a great job of connecting education with the professional field.” ALTERNATIVE FOR DEET Initial results of the research on mosquito and tick repellents are promising. That’s why a grant application was recently submitted to continue the research. Ultimately, the goal is to develop a lotion or spray for personal protection as a better alternative to DEET. “DEET is unpleasant to use, requires very high concentrations, damages plastics, and has li- mited effectiveness.” TropIQ focuses on repellents because preventing mosquito bites is the best protection against malaria. “If you look at malaria control, the greatest successes have come from preventing bites – for example, by distributing bed nets for people to sleep under. Prevention works better than medication.”
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