Aratana Therapeutics, Inc., a pet therapeutics company focused on the licensing, development and commercialization of innovative therapeutics for dogs and cats, today announced an animal health research and development collaboration with AskAt Inc, including an option agreement for multiple therapeutic candidates with potential in pain, allergy and cancer. AskAt is a life-sciences company based in Nagoya, Japan, discovering and developing novel compounds in human health. Members of AskAt's research team, while in a predecessor company, led the initial discovery of compounds that were licensed and developed by Aratana and became two of Aratana's FDA-approved therapeutics.