As you know during the time you spent in my laboratory as a post-doctoral research fellow, we work on the role
of the protein tyrosine phosphatases in cell signaling and disease. Specifically, we have been focusing on a sub
family of protein tyrosine phosphatases known as dual-specificity phosphatases that are involved in the
dephosphorylation of the MAP kinases. These MAP kinase phosphatases (MKPs) have been shown by you and
others to be important for the progression of many important human diseases such as dystrophic muscle disease,
obesity and metabolism as well as inflammatory processes such as fibrosis. With our recent discovery that the
MKPs are druggable there is increasing interest in the potential for the MKPs to be used as therapeutics against
certain human diseases.
As my laboratory continues to work on the MKPs we have required the use of, and have become very reliant on,
the antibodies to the MKPs for our studies. Unfortunately, the quality of the antibodies to the MKPs continues to
be extremely poor. This is not a recent challenge but has plagued the MKP field for the last three decades and has
significantly impeded research progress. Given our recent discussions of your companies advanced capabilities in
producing antibodies that are rigorously validated we would be very enthusiastic for you to generate monoclonal
antibodies to the MKP family of enzymes. These will include the following MKPs; MKP1/DUSP1,
MKP2/DUSP4, MKP3/DUSP6, MKP5/DUSP10 and MKP7/DUSP16. I understand that this is an extensive list
however, if you are successful in developing high quality monoclonal antibodies to these MKPs this would
provide a significant boost to not only our research but the field in general.
In order to facilitate the successful development of these MKP monoclonal antibodies my laboratory will be
willing to participate by providing quality control and validation experiments to support this work. If successful,
we will use these antibodies in our research studies and publish the results using these antibodies. I will also be
willing through my national and international speaking engagements to further publicize the results of these MKP
antibodies in unpublished work to the research community. To let you know, I am scheduled to deliver several
national and international meetings in 2024. In this way, the scientific community will be able to see the quality of
these reagents and will thus provide you with the best form of advertisement to promote your company. I request
that before you endorse the use of any of these antibodies that you obtain my permission prior and that we are in
mutual agreement as to the use of any data that my lab may provide to you as part of our collaboration.
I wish you the best of success and I look forward to a productive collaboration with you and the company on this
project. Please do not hesitate to contact me for further information or questions.
Yours Sincerely,
