Date: 2015-05-21
Type of information: Presentation of results at a congress
phase: preclinical
Announcement: presentation of results at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO)
Company: Aura Biosciences (USA - MA)
Product: AU-011 - modified human papillomavirus capsid protein conjugated to a near infrared dye
Action
mechanism: viral-like nanoparticle. AU-011 consists of Viral-like Nanoparticles that demonstrate highly selective targeting of solid tumors while leaving normal epithelium untouched. Aura’s lead product incorporates its Viral-like Nanoparticle conjugated with a potent cell-killing laser-activated molecule that is delivered efficiently and selectively to cancerous cells, thereby reducing or eliminating the risk of non-specific activity and undesirable toxicity. The molecule is activated by a standard ophthalmologic laser and treatment will be administered in an outpatient visit.
Disease: uveal melanoma
Therapeutic area: Cancer - Oncology
Country:
Trial details:
Latest
news: * On May 21, 2015, Aura Biosciences, a biotech company developing highly tumor-targeted breakthrough therapies for rare cancers, announced that the first oral presentation of its pre-clinical research, ‘Evaluating the in vivo efficacy of a first-in-class drug for the treatment of primary uveal melanoma’, was recently delivered by McGill University Health Centre researchers at the ARVO (Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology) Annual Meeting. In vivo research behind the ARVO oral presentation last week was conducted by Patrick T. Logan, Sultan Aldrees, Mohammed F. Qutub, Natalia Vila, Vasco Bravo-Filho, and Miguel N. Burnier at the Henry C Witelson Lab, Ocular Pathology, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada. In this study, the data showed that AU-011 is efficacious for treating uveal melanoma tumors in an orthotopic xenograft model. Key findings of the research include: Complete response – following three administrations of AU-011 complete tumor eradication was observed by histopathology. The treatment appeared to be “retina sparing.” The observation of tumor necrosis is consistent with the mechanism of action of AU-011.
“In all of our years running this pre-clinical uveal melanoma animal model that we established more than a decade ago, this is the first time that we have seen such promising and encouraging results for the treatment of primary uveal melanoma. We are very excited about the positive impact this might have in uveal melanoma patients,” says Dr. Logan, who is managing the Henry C. Witelson Ocular Pathology pre-clinical unit.
