Genomics in target and drug discovery

Genomics-based discovery of novel therapeutic drug targets requires the design of well-controlled biological or pharmacological experiments with experimental questions and hypotheses that relate to the therapeutic area of interest. This will aid the validation level of differentially expressed genes and hence facilitate the de-selection of the genes that are identified in microarray experiments. We here provide an example of how this approach is followed in the manipulation of human macrophage foam cells towards the discovery of novel drug targets for treatment of atherosclerosis.