Date: 2014-04-30
Type of information: Collaboration agreement
Compound: antibody medicines active in the brain
Company: Lundbeck (Denmark) Nanomerics (UK) University College London UCL (UK) Exeter University (UK)
Therapeutic area: Cancer - Oncology - Mental diseases - Neurodegenerative diseases - Neurological diseases
Type agreement:
Action mechanism:
Disease: dementia, brain cancer
Details: * On April 30, 2014, Nanomerics, a UK drug delivery company, announced a new EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council) funded collaborative research project with UCL, Exeter University and the Danish pharmaceutical company H Lundbeck to develop drug delivery methods to the brain. As part of the new collaboration, the company – which is spin-out from UCL – aims to develop new and exciting ways to deliver antibodies to the brain, building on the molecular envelope technology Nanomerics has developed to deliver previously undeliverable drugs to the organ. The consortium aims to develop antibody medicines that are active in the brain – and hence useful for the treatment of conditions such as dementia and brain cancer. UCL will led research which, it is hoped, will lead to effective treatments, backed with just over £1m in funding from the EPSRC’s Health Impact Partnerships award scheme. The new therapeutic aims to overcome current barriers which make it exceptionally difficult for antibodies to be used to treat brain diseases such as Alzheimer\'s disease and brain tumours. It is thought that antibodies, which are currently used to treat a range of conditions, could also be used to successfully treat neurological conditions. However, if administered orally they can be destroyed in the stomach and intestines and cannot cross the intestinal wall to get into the blood. However – more pressingly for the potentially treatment of neurological disorders – when antibodies are in the blood, they cannot cross the blood vessels in the brain to get to the brain tissue. This inability to access the brain is due to their large size and good solubility in the blood. The new collaboration will aim to overcome this barrier and enable delivery of potential therapeutics directly into the brain.
Financial terms:
Latest news:
