Preclinical Receptor Pharmacology for Drug Discovery

Gifford Bioscience provides specialized preclinical pharmacology services for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies developing drugs for neurological, oncological and metabolic diseases.

We characterize your compound’s  binding affinity and kinetics at its target, (radioligand binding and SPR: K_i, K_d, k_on, k_off), validate target expression and density in cells or native tissue of interest (saturation binding and receptor autoradiography: B_max), determine its functional activity as an agonist, antagonist or allosteric modulator (functional assays: EC₅₀/IC₅₀, E_max), measure how it affects neurotransmitter uptake and release in cells and synaptosomes (uptake and release assays) and establish how much of the target an administered dose engages (ex vivo and in vivo receptor occupancy). 

Our customized assays use human tissue, animal tissues, cultured cells, membranes and recombinant proteins. Every study is designed, run and interpreted by our PhD-level scientists, who work directly with you. Founded in 2017, we are based at The BioHub, on the University of Birmingham’s Research Park, UK.