Bicoll and Naturalpha Announce Nutraceutical Research Alliance

Their joint project will focus on the development of innovative and qualified botanical ingredients for food and nutraceutical applications aiming to prevent disorders that contain an inflammatory component.

Jul 26 2011 --- BICOLL GmbH, a biopharmaceutical drug discovery company specializing in high-tech natural product chemistry and medicinal chemistry to identify novel small molecules for drug discovery and related innovative fields, and Naturalpha, international consulting, scientific and clinical research company in nutrition and health, partner of food and pharmaceutical industries announced that they initiated a research alliance. Their joint project will focus on the development of innovative and qualified botanical ingredients for food and nutraceutical applications aiming to prevent disorders that contain an inflammatory component. Chronic low grade inflammation that exists in both metabolic and neurodegenerative diseases is also included in the scope of the program.

“Few natural ingredients showing a strong potential against inflammatory related disorders and fullfilling regulatory requirments for health claim uses are available today”, explains Dr. Christophe Ripoll, Executive Vice-President R&D of Naturalpha. “We believe that the use of structural and functional biodiversity of secondary plant metabolites is a high asset in our project. The synergy of Bicoll’s strong know-how on extraction and characterization of active phytochemicals and Naturalpha’s well-established expertise in preclinical and clinical research will foster development and commercialization of innovative ingredients.”

The nutraceutical project between Bicoll and Naturalpha is part of the European-funded research cooperation OLNORME II that succeeds the successful initial program OLNORME I.

Dr. Christian Haug, Managing Director of Bicoll and project coordinator for the joint program, commented the background of the new research alliance: “During the initial project OLNORME I, structurally diverse phytochemicals were identified and validated on a new anti-inflammatory biological target. Our joint project with Naturalpha is now intended for the industrial valorization of selected bioactive plant candidates as nutraceutical ingredients.”

The major objective within the cooperation between Bicoll and Naturalpha is to develop a pre-market product for Nutrition & Health applications, chemically and clinically characterized and with a health effect that is scientifically substantiated. This ingredient will be considered for functional food or as a nutraceutical application targeting the prevention of inflammatory related disorders.