With a Central Nervous System focus - particularly on cognitive impairment - Tetra Discovery Partners LLC works in partnership with universities to commercialize IP and conduct proprietary research. The firm's research focuses on developing new treatments for depression and schizophrenia. The Tetras drug discovery platform so far has worked on three drug candidates for Alzheimers disease, depression, and head injury. A lead compound was one to treat memory loss in early-to-moderate Alzheimers disease patients designed to treat memory loss, in early to moderate Alzheimers disease patients. Memory loss is also a major consequence of traumatic brain injury. The cAMP/protein kinase A/pCREB signaling pathway is down-regulated after traumatic brain injury. Tetras drug discovery platform uses a chemistry structure-guided drug design approach to discover mechanistically novel inhibitors of phosphodiesterase 4 (PDE4). Tetra is able to design drug inhibitors that are selective for PDE4B or PDE4D as well as inhibitors that are selective for the PKA-activated forms of the enzymes enabling the firm to develop PDE4 inhibitors that have greater tolerability than earlier compounds while enhancing efficacy.
