Myriad Genetics Presents Pivotal Validation Study for New riskScore™ Test at the 2017 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium

On December 6, 2017 Myriad Genetics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MYGN), a leader in molecular diagnostics and personalized medicine, reported results from a ground-breaking validation study to better define the risk of breast cancer in women of European ancestry who test negative for a hereditary cancer mutation with the myRisk Hereditary Cancer test (Press release, Myriad Genetics, DEC 6, 2017, View Source [SID1234522406]). The results are being featured in a Spotlight presentation today at the 2017 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium (SABCS) in San Antonio, Texas.

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"Myriad Genetics is the first to bring to market a comprehensive approach to lifetime breast cancer risk assessment that includes 28 genes, family history evaluation, and well-validated SNPs through riskScore," said Johnathan Lancaster, M.D., Ph.D., chief medical officer, Myriad Genetics. "This comprehensive approach delivers the most precise tool in the industry to help physicians assess a patient’s breast cancer risk and empower choices that may prevent a patient’s breast cancer from ever happening."

A summary of this study appears below and more information about the company’s presentation can be found at: View Source Follow Myriad on Twitter via @MyriadGenetics and stay informed about symposium news and updates by using the hashtag #SABCS17.

myRisk Hereditary Cancer with riskScore Spotlight Presentation
Title: Development and Validation of a Combined Residual Risk Score to Predict Breast Cancer Risk in Unaffected Women Negative for Mutations on a Multi-Gene Hereditary Cancer Panel.
Presenter: Elisha Hughes, Ph.D.
Date: Wednesday, Dec. 6, 2017, 5:00—7:00 p.m.
Location: Poster Discussion, PD1-08

This study was designed to validate the new riskScore test’s ability to predict the 5-year and lifetime risk of breast cancer compared to the Tyrer-Cuzick model alone. riskScore is a novel test that combines data from the Tyrer-Cuzick model with 86 genetic markers, called single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), to comprise a combined risk score that accounts for clinical, familial and genetic variables.

The validation study included 1,617 women: 990 women with breast cancer and 627 controls. The results show that riskScore is a highly statistically significant predictor of the 5-year and lifetime risk of breast cancer (p=5.2×10-39 and p=4.1×10-35, respectively). Moreover, riskScore was statistically significantly superior to Tyrer-Cuzick alone for both 5-year and lifetime risk of breast cancer (1.0×10-12 and 8.3×10-13, respectively), underscoring the important contribution of the SNPs to the test.

"The combination of the SNP panel with Tyrer-Cuzick provides even greater precision than previously demonstrated from family history models," said Jerry Lanchbury, Ph.D., chief scientific officer, Myriad Genetics. "As a result, we believe our myRisk Hereditary Cancer test, now enhanced with riskScore, provides the most comprehensive breast cancer risk assessment available today."

In a separate analysis, the riskScore test was applied to a real-world cohort of 6,479 women who tested negative for mutations in 11 genes associated with hereditary breast cancer to determine their remaining lifetime risk of developing breast cancer. The results show that riskScore remaining lifetime risk estimates ranged from 0.88 percent to 66.4 percent (Graph 1). Additionally, 38.2 percent of patients tested with riskScore had a lifetime risk >20 percent and 7.4 percent had a lifetime risk >3 times the general population (35 percent).

"These data confirm the important contribution of SNPs to breast cancer risk assessment in unaffected women who test negative for mutations in hereditary breast cancer genes with a precise measure of breast cancer risk," said Lanchbury. "The addition of the SNP data appears to be especially helpful in identifying those patients at higher risk for developing breast cancer."

Graph 1: View Source

"Patients who are above 20 percent lifetime risk are candidates for additional screening based on U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendations and those above 35 percent may be candidates for more aggressive medical interventions," said Lancaster. "Importantly, these data show that riskScore identifies a larger number of high-risk patients than either BRCA1 or BRCA2 testing and represents the next major epoch in hereditary cancer risk assessment and patient care."

About riskScore
riskScore is a new clinically validated personalized medicine tool that enhances Myriad’s myRisk Hereditary Cancer test. riskScore helps to further predict a women’s lifetime risk of developing breast cancer using clinical risk factors and genetic-markers throughout the genome. The test incorporates data from greater than 80 single nucleotide polymorphisms identified through 20 years of genome wide association studies in breast cancer and was validated in our laboratory to predict breast cancer risk in women of European descent. This data is then combined with a best-in-class family and personal history algorithm, the Tyrer-Cuzick model, to provide every patient with individualized breast cancer risk.

About Myriad myRisk Hereditary Cancer
The Myriad myRisk Hereditary Cancer test uses an extensive number of sophisticated technologies and proprietary algorithms to evaluate 28 clinically significant genes associated with eight hereditary cancer sites including: breast, colon, ovarian, endometrial, pancreatic, prostate and gastric cancers and melanoma.

Moleculin’s WP1066 Drug receives $2 million Private Grant

On December 6, 2017 Moleculin Biotech, Inc., (NASDAQ: MBRX) ("Moleculin" or the "Company"), a clinical stage pharmaceutical company focused on the development of anti-cancer drug candidates, some of which are based on license agreements with The University of Texas System on behalf of the MD Anderson Cancer Center ("MD Anderson"), reported that its WP1066 drug will receive $2 million in private grant funding for its recently announced Investigational New Drug ("IND") clearance for a physician-sponsored Phase I trial of Moleculin’s drug WP1066 in patients with recurrent malignant glioma and brain metastasis from melanoma (Press release, Moleculin, DEC 6, 2017, View Source [SID1234522405]).

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"On the heels of our recent IND announcement, we are honored to now announce that a significant private grant has been awarded to help cover the costs of the upcoming brain tumor trial at MD Anderson," commented Walter Klemp, Chairman and CEO of Moleculin. "We should emphasize that this $2 million grant is in addition to two prestigious SPORE grants awarded by the National Cancer Institute ("NCI")."

Mr. Klemp added, "The Specialized Programs of Research Excellence ("SPORE") program was established by NCI to enable the rapid and efficient movement of basic scientific findings into clinical settings and it is now considered a highly prestigious award for promising anticancer technologies. Due to the highly competitive nature of such grants and their and external review processes, we believe they provide further validation of our program and the approach to the treatment of brain cancer and cancer metastasis to the brain. Overall, the combination of all of these funding sources not only allows this trial to begin to move forward, we believe it signals strong support for the development of this class of potential drugs and more specifically, significant enthusiasm for the potential of WP1066 to shut down unwanted cell signaling and to empower the immune system to fight cancer."

The grants described here do not flow through Moleculin’s financial statements, but instead are applied to the cost of preclinical and clinical activities at and conducted by MD Anderson.

Cellectar Announces Expansion of Relapsed/Refractory Multiple Myeloma Cohort in Phase 2 Trial of CLR 131

On December 6, 2017 Cellectar Biosciences (Nasdaq: CLRB), a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focused on the discovery, development and commercialization of drugs for the treatment of cancer, reported that the company will increase the targeted patient enrollment in the relapsed/refractory (R/R) multiple myeloma (MM) cohort of its currently enrolling Phase 2 clinical trial of CLR 131. Data from the MM cohort of the study demonstrated that the treatment exceeded pre-specified criteria for clinically meaningful benefit (Press release, Cellectar Biosciences, DEC 6, 2017, View Source [SID1234522403]). As a result, the cohort will be expanded up to as many as 40 patients.

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"The initial results from the multiple myeloma arm of this Phase 2 study underscore the potential for CLR 131 to benefit these heavily pre-treated and relapsed patients. We continue to see clinical benefit with CLR 131 in both our Phase 1 and Phase 2 clinical studies and look forward to reporting additional data from the both of these clinical studies next year.," stated James Caruso, president and chief executive officer of Cellectar Biosciences. "Furthermore, we are pleased to have achieved this key clinical milestone within our projected timelines" added Mr. Caruso.

Amgen To Webcast Investor Call At ASH 2017

On December 6, 2017 Amgen (NASDAQ:AMGN) reported that it will host a webcast call for the investment community at the 59th American Society of Hematology (ASH) (Free ASH Whitepaper) Annual Meeting & Exposition on Saturday, Dec. 9, 2017, at 11:30 a.m. ET (Press release, Amgen, DEC 6, 2017, View Source;p=RssLanding&cat=news&id=2321467 [SID1234522402]). David M. Reese, M.D., senior vice president of Translational Sciences and Oncology at Amgen, together with other members of Amgen’s management team and a clinical investigator, will participate to discuss the Company’s oncology program, including our BiTE immunotherapy platform.

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Live audio of the investor call will be simultaneously broadcast over the Internet and will be available to members of the news media, investors and the general public.

The webcast, as with other selected presentations regarding developments in Amgen’s business given by management at certain investor and medical conferences, can be found on Amgen’s website, www.amgen.com, under Investors. Information regarding presentation times, webcast availability and webcast links are noted on Amgen’s Investor Relations Events Calendar. The webcast will be archived and available for replay for at least 90 days after the event.

Fate Therapeutics and University of California San Diego Launch Research Collaboration to Develop iPSC-Derived CAR NK Cell Cancer Immunotherapies

On December 6, 2017 Fate Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:FATE), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company dedicated to the development of programmed cellular immunotherapies for cancer and immune disorders, reported a partnership with the University of California San Diego to develop off-the-shelf, chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-targeted natural killer (NK) cell cancer immunotherapies (Press release, Fate Therapeutics, DEC 6, 2017, View Source [SID1234522400]). The two-year collaboration is being led by Dan S. Kaufman, M.D., Ph.D., Professor of Medicine in the Division of Regenerative Medicine and Director of Cell Therapy at UC San Diego School of Medicine.

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"NK cells have the inherent ability to target a diversity of stress-induced ligands on tumor cells and can be safely administered without the need for individualized patient matching. Additionally, NK cells engineered with chimeric antigen receptors can be targeted to tumors with high specificity. This duality provides CAR NK cells with the unique potential to overcome antigen escape and address tumor heterogeneity, which are distinct advantages over patient-specific CAR T-cell immunotherapies," said Dr. Kaufman. "We have now identified several CAR constructs optimized for NK cell signaling, persistence and cytotoxicity, and combined our targeting content with Fate Therapeutics’ induced pluripotent stem cell product platform for development of off-the-shelf CAR-targeted NK cell products using clonal engineered master pluripotent cell lines."

The CAR constructs identified by the collaborators contain transmembrane and co-stimulatory domains that enhance antigen-specific NK cell activation and improve the effector function of NK cells. Fate Therapeutics holds an exclusive license to the intellectual property covering these CAR constructs and maintains an option to exclusively license intellectual property arising from all research and development activities under the collaboration.

At the 59th American Society of Hematology (ASH) (Free ASH Whitepaper) Annual Meeting and Exposition, Dr. Kaufman and Fate Therapeutics will present preclinical data on Saturday, December 9, 2017 highlighting CAR-targeted NK cells derived from an induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) engineered with a specific CAR construct containing a NKG2D transmembrane domain, a 2B4 co-stimulatory domain and a CD3ζ signaling domain. In preclinical studies using an ovarian cancer xenograft model, the collaborators have shown that a single dose of CAR-targeted NK cells derived from iPSCs engineered with this specific CAR construct markedly inhibited tumor growth and significantly enhanced survival as compared to NK cells containing a CAR construct commonly used for T-cell immunotherapy. Dr. Kaufman was recently awarded $5.15 million by the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) to advance clinical translation of NK cells derived from pluripotent stem cells into a standardized treatment for treating hematologic malignancies.

iPSCs possess the unique dual properties of unlimited self-renewal and differentiation potential into all cell types of the body. The engineering of iPSCs can be done as a one-time genetic modification event and a single iPSC can be selected for creation of a clonal master pluripotent cell line. Similar to master cell lines used for the manufacture of therapeutic antibodies, a clonal master pluripotent cell line can be used to repeatedly create clonal populations of effector cells. This first-of-kind approach enables large-scale generation of off-the-shelf, targeted, homogeneous cell products that can be administered in repeat doses to mediate more effective pharmacologic activity, including in combination with cycles of other cancer treatments.