In 2018, Morelos had the highest concentration of researchers per capita nationwide, with a rate of 100 researchers per 100,000 inhabitants; The entity hosts the most important research centers, which have generated, among others, inventions very relevant to the daily lives of citizens.
Morelos is one of the pioneering centers within the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS) in the production of articles and scientific inventions that have been successfully patented, Centro de Investigación Biomédica del Sur (CIBIS), located in Xochitepec, so far has 24 of patents granted.
CIBIS is one of the five strategic centers that IMSS has distributed throughout the country to conduct biomedical research; Since 1985, its mission has been to generate scientific knowledge in the fields of pharmacology, phytochemistry, biotechnology, pharmaceutical technology and medicine for the development of safe and effective drugs in the treatment of the most common diseases in Mexican society.
Alejandro Zamilpa Álvarez, director of CIBIS, explained that because their goal is to find a solution to the main health problems of Mexicans, they need to identify which are the most common today, but also what will be the real challenges for the health system in the next 15 and 20 years; the most studied were the central nervous system, dermatological problems, diabetes, obesity and cancer, which had an impact on research that later became a technological development.
As of today, CIBIS has applied for a total of 32 patents, of which the Mexican Institute of Industrial Property (IMPI) has granted an average of 24, making it the IMSS biomedical research center with the highest number of patents.
With an express question, the doctor of chemistry mentioned that, in order to complete a technological development that can be subjected to a protection process, several research steps must be completed, the first includes basic research in which possible solutions to the main most common problems. health in Mexican society.
Each of the CIBIS developments involves the use of standardized extracts of the active principles of plant species used in traditional Mexican medicine.
The second stage is the pharmaceutical design of each extract to generate different presentations of phytomedicines, the disciplines participating in this stage, he explained, are toxicology and pharmacokinetics that help determine the safety, distribution and elimination of these drugs.
The idea culminates in clinical trials that allow them to demonstrate the safety and therapeutic efficacy of these phytomedicines – drugs of plant origin made with standardized extracts -.
Biotechnology, the researcher said, helps them guarantee the source of the raw material to obtain a uniform procedure for the production of plant species or their active principles.
To date, CIBIS research has only directly benefited volunteer patients who have participated in its clinical trials; however, when the institution licenses the exploitation of these patents or decides to use them to generate its own treatments, Mexican society in general will benefit.
Some of the registered patents were: The use of active principles for the manufacture of phytomedicines, as in the case of Galphimine B, which is used to produce anxiolytic drugs, or the steroid saponin SC-2, which has demonstrated therapeutic efficacy and safety in the treatment of yeast infection ( yeast infection).
The use of plant species such as Solanum chrysotrichum and Mimosa tenuiflora to produce phytomedicines that help treat dermatological and gastric diseases, respectively, has also been protected.
Pharmaceutical preparations and extraction methods for the production of active ingredients have also been the subject of patenting, as well as biotechnological processes for obtaining extracts and active ingredients, as well as procedures for stabilizing extracts.
Most technological developments include a rigorous collaboration process between biologists, pharmacologists, chemists, biotechnologists and doctors, as well as external collaborations with taxonomists specializing in herbs, for this reason, the number of inventors for each patent varies from three to seven researchers.
Although for CIBIS each of the patents was a great achievement by involving long years of research, they have a special case of a Galphimia glauca patent that has even been the subject of several awards in the field of innovation.
CIBIS is made up of an average of eight researchers.