ZymoGenetics is among the leaders in the race to unravel the functions of human genes.

The classical approach to medical research is to first find a therapeutic area then to initiate the search for active substances.
At ZymoGenetics - Novo Nordisk's US Health Care discovery centre in Seattle - they have taken a different approach. Here the aim is to determine the function of human genes whose identification is currently progressing so fast. In simple terms, certain genes code for certain proteins. And certain proteins can be used as drugs. So unlike the classical approach to medical research, you only identify what therapeutic areas a drug may be useful in once you have discovered the function of a particular gene.
The ZymoGenetics approach functions as a supplement to the more traditional methods that are still vital to the continued development of new products and therapies at Novo Nordisk's research centres both in Denmark and in other countries.
"The human genome will be identified within four or five years. So we have turned our research strategy completely around and are concentrating on finding the function of those genes that have been identified," says Claus Kühl, president of ZymoGenetics.
ZymoGenetics receives a continuous stream of data from Incyte Pharmaceuticals, Sequana and Lark, companies specialising in collecting, selling or generating genetic data. ZymoGenetics is one of the relatively few companies in the world with access to these data.
Identifying genes is progressing much more rapidly than discovering their ultimate biological or therapeutic functions. Even though every human gene will be identified within a short span of years, it may take ten years before scientists have discovered precisely what they do.
"The competition is fierce, but we are among the leading companies in the world doing just that. Simply because we adopted this strategy at a very early stage and because our research team has put together the right combination of scientific disciplines, including molecular biologists, bioinformaticians, biochemists, and biologists," says Kühl.
ZymoGenetics' research strategy means that they conduct research that can lead to the discovery of new drugs that lie outside Novo Nordisk's three core areas in Health Care - Diabetes Care, Women's Health Care and Growth Disorders.
"If we come across genes or proteins that can be used in the treatment of cancer, for example, we can either develop and market the drugs ourselves or swap our findings with another pharmaceutical company that may have found a gene that could be of vital importance to the treatment of diabetes," explains Kühl.

Claus Kühl: The identification of the human genome is going to be an important tool in the development of new medicines.