[Federal Register Volume 71, Number 30 (Tuesday, February 14, 2006)]
[Notices]
[Pages 7781-7782]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: E6-2015]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

National Institutes of Health


Government-Owned Inventions; Availability for Licensing

AGENCY: National Institutes of Health, Public Health Service, HHS.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The inventions listed below are owned by an agency of the U.S. 
Government and are available for licensing in the U.S. in accordance 
with 35 U.S.C. 207 to achieve expeditious commercialization of results 
of federally funded research and development. Foreign patent 
applications are filed on selected inventions to extend market coverage 
for companies and may also be available for licensing.

ADDRESSES: Licensing information and copies of the U.S. patent 
applications listed below may be obtained by writing to the indicated 
licensing contact at the Office of Technology Transfer, National 
Institutes of Health, 6011 Executive Boulevard, Suite 325, Rockville, 
Maryland 20852-3804; telephone: 301/496-7057; fax: 301/402-0220. A 
signed Confidential Disclosure Agreement will be required to receive 
copies of the patent applications.

Autoantibody Screening for Cancer Diagnosis

Yoon S. Cho-Chung (NCI).
U.S. Provisional Application filed (HHS Reference No. E-057-2006/0-US-
01).
Licensing Contact: David A. Lambertson; 301/435-4632; 
[email protected].

    There are a number of specific antigens, such as alpha-fetal 
protein (AFP), nonmucinous ovarian cancer antigen (CA125), vascular 
endothelial growth factor (VEGF), prostate-specific antigen (PSA), 
which are secreted into the serum of patients who have particular 
cancers. Kits for detecting these antigens are generally used as a 
means of diagnosing patients as having a specific cancer. However, the 
current methods suffer from a lack of sensitivity.
    The instant technology provides a method for the early diagnosis of 
different cancers that does not suffer the drawbacks of the current 
assays. The inventors observed that auto-antibodies against the cancer 
marker antigens can be detected in the serum of patients with 
particular cancers. This new technology is designed to screen for the 
autoantibodies for a spectrum of secreted tumor antigens in a single 
assay (BBA, in press). This provides a highly sensitive assay for 
diagnosing cancer at an early stage, or when the tumor is of a very 
small size. Claims of the instant invention are drawn to methods and 
kits for performing this analysis as a means of diagnosing cancer.
    In addition to licensing, the technology is available for further 
development through collaborative research opportunities with the 
inventors.

Therapeutic HIV Vaccine Vectors for Individuals Receiving 
Antiretroviral Therapy

Barbara K. Felber et al. (NCI).
U.S. Provisional Application filed 09 Jul 2004 (HHS Reference No. E-
249-2004/0-US-01); PCT Application No. PCT/US2005/024498 filed 11 Jul 
2005 (HHS Reference No. E-249-2004/1-PCT-01);
PCT Application No. PCT/US01/45624 filed 01 Nov 2001, which published 
as WO 02/36806 on 10 May 2002 (HHS Reference No. E-308-2000/0-PCT-02);
National Stage filed in EP, CA, AU, JP, and U.S. (HHS Reference No. E-
308-2000/0-US-07).
    Licensing Contact: Susan Ano; 301/435-5515; [email protected].

    Antiretroviral therapy (ART) against HIV leads to control of 
viremia, but it does not eradicate the virus. Thus, interruption of ART 
leads to virus rebound. In addition, prolonged ART is associated with 
toxicity and development of virus resistance. The technology describes 
the use of DNA vaccine vectors that produce either secreted or 
intracellularly degraded antigens for administration to individuals 
receiving ART. These DNA vectors have recently been shown to work 
unusually well in controlling viremia when administered as DNA vaccines 
to SIV-infected monkeys that are undergoing treatment with 
antiretroviral agents. The current technologies would decrease the drug 
dependence and assist in clearing or reducing virus burden.
    In addition to licensing, the technology is available for further 
development through collaborative research opportunities with the 
inventors.

Haplotypes of Human Bitter Taste Receptor Genes

Dennis Drayna and Un-Kyung Kim (NIDCD).
PCT International Application No. PCT/US2004/019489, filed 18 June 2004 
(priority date 19 June 2003), International Publication No. WO 2005/
007891, Publication Date 27 January 2005 and global IP (HHS Reference 
Nos. E-222-2003/0 and E-222-2003/1).
Licensing Contact: Susan Carson, D.Phil., 301 435-5020; 
[email protected].

    Bitter taste has evolved in mammals as a crucial, important warning 
signal against ingestion of poisonous or toxic compounds. However, many 
beneficial compounds are also bitter, and taste masking of bitter 
tasting pharmaceutical

[[Page 7782]]

compounds is a billion dollar industry. The diversity of compounds that 
elicit bitter-taste sensations is very large and more than two dozen 
members of the T2R bitter taste receptor family have been identified. 
Individuals are now known to be genetically predisposed to respond or 
not to respond to the bitter taste of a number of substances. For 
example, large individual differences in the perception of bitterness 
have been well documented in compounds as different as nicotine, 
thiocyanates such as those found in cruciferous vegetables, and many 
bitter beta-glucopyranosides. This may have broad implications for 
nutritional status and tobacco use and common allelic variants of a 
member of the T2R bitter taste receptor gene family have been shown to 
underlie variation in the ability to taste phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) 
[Science (2003) 299, 1221-1225; HHS Ref No: E-169-2001/0].
    Scientists at the NIDCD have extended these results to other bitter 
taste receptors and have sequenced 22 of the 24 known T2R genes in a 
series of populations worldwide, including Northern Europeans, 
Hungarians, Japanese, Cameroonians, Pygmies and South American Indians 
and the present invention includes these isolated sequences and their 
variants. This includes a total of 127 SNPs and 103 different protein 
coding haplotypes, including those defined for the PTC Receptor (T2R38) 
[E-169-2001/0]. The inventors showed that 77% of the SNPs identified 
caused an amino acid substitution in the encoded receptor protein, 
giving rise to a very high degree of receptor protein variation in the 
population (Kim et al. (2005) Human Mutation 26, 199-204). The 
frequencies of these different haplotypes have been shown to differ in 
different populations which will aid in population-specific studies, 
such as those targeting differences in taste perception between 
Europeans and Asians, for example.
    The invention available for licensing includes these novel SNPs and 
haplotypes and methods of use, which can be used to better identify and 
characterize different groups of individuals within and between 
populations that vary in their bitter taste abilities. This is 
important to the food and flavoring industry, for example, where these 
variants can be used to aid in the development of a variety of taste 
improvements in foods and orally administered medications. [Also 
available for licensing in the Human Taste Receptor Haplotype patent 
portfolio is HHS Ref No. E-169-2001/0-PCT-02: Phenylthiocarbamide Taste 
Receptor, International Publication No. WO 2003/008627, PCT filed July 
19, 2002 and global IP, and HHS Ref. No 099-2005/0: Human Sweet and 
Umami Taste Receptor Genes, U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/
671,173 filed April 2005].
    In addition to licensing, the technology is available for further 
development through collaborative research opportunities with the 
inventors.

    Dated: February 2, 2006.
Steven M. Ferguson,
Director, Division of Technology Development and Transfer, Office of 
Technology Transfer, National Institutes of Health.
[FR Doc. E6-2015 Filed 2-13-06; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4140-01-P