Norak: Blocking desensitization

After selling Medco Research Inc. to King Pharmaceuticals Inc. in late 1999, Roger Blevins called Duke University looking for an interesting technology to build a new company around. The result is Norak Biosciences Inc., which is built on a cell-based bioassay to screen for drugs that bind G protein-coupled receptors that was developed by three Duke researchers.

Norak has transformed the technology, now called Transfluor, from a low throughput, benchtop assay into an automated, high throughput commercial-scale product. ...