UQDI melanoma drug anisina set to hit clinics in 2016
SYDNEY, April 9, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- US-Australian drug discovery company, Novogen (NRT:ASX; NVGN: NASDAQ), today announced that studies conducted at The University of Queensland Diamantina Institute (UQDI) revealed that experimental drug, Anisina, killed melanoma cells irrespective of their mutational status.
Anisina is being brought into the clinic in early-2016 for the treatment of solid cancers, with late-stage melanoma and prostate cancer in adults and neuroblastoma in children being three key target indications. The current results give strength to the aim of conducting a clinical study in patients with late-stage melanoma using a combined treatment of Anisina and vincristine.
The incidence of melanoma has doubled since 1973 and continues to increase, with countries such as Australia and New Zealand taking the lead with one of the highest rates of morbidity and mortality of melanoma. Around 12,500 new cases are diagnosed each year in Australia with malignant melanoma and it is responsible for over 1,500 deaths. In the US, approximately 74,000 thousand cases of invasive melanoma are expected to be diagnosed, with 10,000 deaths. In the UK, malignant melanoma is the 5th most common cancer.
There are limited therapeutic options for the treatment of metastatic melanoma as standard of care chemotherapy is ineffective against this highly resistant disease.
The University of Queensland Diamantina Institute (UQDI) screened Anisina against a panel of melanoma cells obtained from patients and which represented the spectrum of mutations (BRAF, NRAS and c-KIT) commonly found in the community. Anisina was uniformly cytotoxic to the panel of cells, regardless of their mutational status. Importantly, Anisina showed a high level of specificity to cancer cells, with toxicity against normal melanocytes requiring a four-fold drug level.
Nikolas Haass MD PhD and Brian Gabrielli PhD from the University of Queensland Diamantina Institute conducted the research studies.
Dr Haass said, "These findings from the preliminary screen with Anisina are exciting. Finding a compound that is equally effective against a wide panel of melanoma cell types irrespective of the genetic background has been a long-held goal. The University of Queensland Diamantina Institute is pleased to be part of the effort to bring this new drug candidate into the clinic."
