The South Carolina Research Authority Wednesday presented Argolyn Bioscience with a $200,000 check during a meeting of the Medical University of South Carolina's Entrepreneur's Forum.

The funds will provide the North Charleston-based company with additional capital for research and operations for the company's peptide-based drug development. The award also marks the first funding under the South Carolina Innovation Center legislation, passed by the state Legislature in July 2005.

"By providing this capital, we are executing the first in a series of investments that are designed to grow the knowledge economy in South Carolina," said Jim Stritzinger, executive vice president and general manager of the South Carolina Public Interest Research. "We are fulfilling our mandate to identify and foster the growth of technology companies in the state through adequate capitalization and commercialization."

"Argolyn is a peptide development company," said Pearce Gilbert, president and chief executive officer of Argolyn. "In an industry spending billions of dollars on the discovery and acquisition of innovative products, Argolyn has positioned itself to repeatedly create unique and proprietary new product opportunities."

Argolyn is a privately-held biopharmaceutical company dedicated to discovering and developing drug candidates to treat psychosis, pain and other disorders. Gilbert and Dr. Thomas Dix, a faculty member at the Medical University of South Carolina Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, founded the company. Dix has led the inventions and patents regarding the pharmaceutical peptides.