Clinical Challenges
The cancer battlefield is strewn with casualties, as we fight an ominous war with an evasive enemy. Tumor cells for instance upregulate autophagy to escape from cancer treatment. Upregulated autophagy then drives drug resistance, metabolic changes, and immunosuppression.
Precision Nanomedicine to Treat Tumors effectively
We at Theranostec developed a nano- autophagy inhibitor by integrating the power of nanotechnology and medicinal chemistry. Our drug can effectively eradicate cancer cells, particularly cancer stem cells while sparing normal cells. Our nano drug is effective as a single agent or in combination therapy. Our research shows tremendous success metrics in maintenance therapy to inhibit tumor recurrence. We attack the problem at its root, overcoming resistance and preventing cancer recurrence.
Business Traction
Additionally, we developed a phototherapeutic nano-transformer that shows a curative effect in cancer models. Both programs strengthen the Theranostec pipeline that drive growth potential to capture multiple cancer indications in a $27B market. Theranostec received multiple SBIR grants for optimization and IND-enabling studies that will move both of our programs into Phase 1 clinical trials.
Patents
The chemical composition of our new drugs, the nanoparticle technology and applications are under strong patent protection.
Publications
- Ma et al, Pharmacophore hybridisation and nanoscale assembly to discover self-delivering lysosomotropic new-chemical entities for cancer therapy. Nature Communications, 2020, 11, Article number: 4615
- Ma et al, A pH‐Driven Small‐Molecule Nanotransformer Hijacks Lysosomes and Overcomes Autophagy‐Induced Resistance in Cancer. Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 2022, Volume61, Issue35, e202204567
Pipeline
Funding
- Received multiple SBIR Phase I and Phase II grants ($4.7 Million).
- Recently received $3 Million research funding through our lab to develop our approach in companion animals.