SERAF Therapeutics, Inc., a New Mexico C-corporation, was founded in April, 1999. The company's mission was to develop cost-effective therapies for inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. SERAF's Anagel™ technology is based on targeting the delivery of therapeutic compounds selectively to particular cells of the immune system. Primary disease targets are coronary heart disease, rheumatoid arthritis, and asthma. This is to announce, with regret, that the company has been placed on inactive status. This does not reflect on the likelihood of the utility of the technology to treat human illness, which remains in the opinion of the company's founder and president, entirely viable. Patents remain in force. Mission Statement. The mission of Seraf Therapeutics, Inc. is to develop cost-effective therapies based on targeted drug delivery create a haven for basic scientific research on cellular messaging maximize employee involvement through effective management generate a superior return for investors by these activities. Many disease conditions are left untreated because drug development has become so expensive. Patients with unusual disease conditions also underserved.  Seraf Therapeutics seeks to make therapies more widely available and to tailor therapies more closely to need by providing targeted delivery of existing drugs.   Therapeutic target.  The monocyte is a chemical factory and an arsenal of the immune system.  The diagram to the right shows schematically some of the activities of the monocyte.  The monocyte internalizes foreign proteins, digests them and displays fragments on the cell surface for recognition by the rest of the immune system.  The monocyte also releases reactive oxygen species to kill invaders.  The reactive oxygen species oxidize LDL, which is then taken up by the monocyte in atherosclerosis.  Aspirin and some other anti-inflammatories inhibit cyclooxygenase production.  Cortisone binds to the GC receptor, with profound effects on immunity. CLICK TO ENLARGE   Anagel™ represents a simple, patented technology to selectively deliver drugs to certain cells of the immune system.  As shown to the right, fluorescein-labeled Anagel™ is rapidly internalized by white blood cells.  The yellow color is fluorescein, while the blue color is stained nuclear material.  MONOCYTES TAKE UP ANAGEL™     The picture to the right shows cells of the immune system.  The nuclei of the cells are stained blue and a surface antigen is stained red using anti-Mac1: PE.  IDENTIFICATION OF MONOCYTES BY Ab LABELING     Preliminary results were encouraging.  An experiment was performed to test whether drugs are efficiently released from Anagel™.  Animals were primed with a foreign protein to stimulate an immune response.  The spleens were removed and the spleen cells exposed to one prototype of Anagel™, then tested to see if they were still capable of generating an immune response, as measured by T-cell proliferation, when stimulated by the protein.  As the graph to the right shows, Anagel™ (purple) was just as effective as the drug alone (green) in suppressing T-cell proliferation.  This suggests that Anagel™ does deliver drug efficiently. CLICK TO ENLARGE     SCIENTIFIC INQUIRIES WELCOME! When SERAF Therapeutics receives funding, it will have needs in immunology, microbiology, analytical and synthetic chemistry, and other scientific disciplines. Write and ask! Serafcom@aol.com