On October 26, 2021 Purple Biotech Ltd. ("Purple Biotech", or the "Company") (NASDAQ/TASE: PPBT), a clinical-stage company developing first-in-class, effective and durable therapies by overcoming tumor immune evasion and drug resistance, reported the expansion of an existing research agreement, led by Menashe Bar-Eli, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Cancer Biology, at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, and will evaluate the potential efficacy of the combination of NT219, a dual inhibitor, novel small molecule that simultaneously targets IRS1/2 and STAT3, and immuno-oncology drugs, such as anti-CTLA4 or anti-PD1/PDL1 antibodies (Press release, Purple Biotech, OCT 26, 2021, View Source [SID1234591959]).
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"Previously completed preclinical studies have shown that NT219 is able to overcome resistance to certain treatment approaches, with results demonstrating sensitization of various tumor types to the approved therapies," said Hadas Reuveni, Ph.D., VP Research and Development of Purple Biotech. "This new research leverages preclinical data depicting the interface of the lymphoid and myeloid systems within the biology, as well as a target in human cancer. It provides an opportunity to address the alterations of metabolism of both the tumor and the responsive human immune system, altering a "cold" tumor unresponsive to immune oncology approaches into a responsive "hot" one. This collaboration will also provide an opportunity to assess potential synergies mitigating anti-apoptotic mechanisms associated with TGFbeta and the canonical WNT pathway."
"Our prior preclinical studies with NT219 demonstrated its effect on the STAT3 and IRS pathways and the encouraging clinical data presented at ASCO (Free ASCO Whitepaper) 2021 supports the further evaluation of potentially combining NT219 with immunotherapy agents," said Dr. Reuveni. "We look forward to understanding the potential impact of such combinations through this expanded research collaboration. Based on the profile of NT219 and the data generated to date, we believe there are multiple potential benefits that can be derived by combining NT219 with certain immuno-oncology drugs."
"We are thrilled to expand this collaboration, and we believe that combining NT219 with immune-oncology backbone therapies is an important path forward for our NT219 clinical program," said Isaac Israel, Chief Executive Officer of Purple Biotech. "The collaboration is an important step in the translational work that could support the advancement of this potential treatment into the clinic. We recently presented promising initial clinical data for NT219 as a monotherapy treatment for advanced solid tumors and look forward to the availability of additional top-line data from the first part of this ongoing Phase 1/2 clinical trial."
Previous research conducted by Dr. Bar-Eli demonstrated that treatment of mice-bearing melanoma with early generation compounds of NT219 inhibited tumor growth and metastasis by blocking STAT3 and IGF1R/IRS signaling. The inhibition of downstream pro-angiogenic and pro-invasion factors in-vivo, such as VEGF, MMP-2 and IL-8, was shown, as well as the suppression of macrophage recruitment to the tumor microenvironment.