Aethlon Medical Receives Notice Of DARPA Contract Renewal

SAN DIEGO, Sept. 22, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Aethlon Medical, Inc. (OTCQB: AEMD), the pioneer in developing targeted therapeutic devices to address infectious disease, cancer and other life-threatening conditions, disclosed today that the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has informed the Company that it plans to exercise an option to proceed with year four of a five-year $5.9 million contract that was awarded to Aethlon on September 30, 2011 under DARPA's Dialysis-Like Therapeutics (DLT) program.

The fourth year of Aethlon's DLT contract contains three milestones representing a potential of $669,292 in revenue opportunity.  To date, Aethlon has invoiced $4,252,037 to DARPA for achieving twenty of twenty-three milestone objectives targeted in the first three years of the DLT program.    

The goal of the Dialysis-Like Therapeutics (DLT) program is to develop a portable device that removes "dirty" blood from the body, separates harmful agents, and returns "clean" blood to the body in a manner similar to dialysis treatment of kidney failure. The resulting device could decrease the morbidity and mortality of sepsis, thereby saving thousands of lives and billions of dollars in the United States annually.

To do so, the DLT program seeks to develop multiple component technologies, integrate them into a portable device, and rigorously validate device effectiveness. Key technical areas and representative technical approaches include:

• Persistent interrogation of the entire blood volume via sensing technologies such as surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS). This capability may enable early identification of bacteria, viruses, toxins, and cytokines.
• High-flow fluid manipulation without the use of anticoagulants via novel biocompatible/biomimetic architectures and advanced surface functionalization chemistries.
• Continuous removal of pathogens, toxins, activated cells, exosomes, and cytokines via a diverse suite of "label-free" technologies such as synthetic mannose binding lectins and selective adsorption cartridges.
• Closed-loop therapy with system feedback to monitor and redirect patient state based on conditional probability and reduced order techniques.

The integration and validation of these component technologies focuses on establishing a path to FDA Investigational Device Exemption (IDE) before the completion of the program. From there, the device will be available for transition to military medical commands and clinical trials required for final regulatory approval.

In addition to treating sepsis, the DLT device represents a flexible platform that may be configured to combat engineered and evolving pathogens.

About Aethlon Medical, Inc.

Aethlon Medical creates medical devices that target unmet therapeutic needs in infectious disease and cancer.  The company's lead product is the Aethlon Hemopurifier®, a first-in-class device that selectively targets the rapid elimination of circulating viruses and tumor-secreted exosomes that promote cancer progression.  Exosome Sciences, Inc. is a majority owned subsidiary that is advancing exosome-based products to diagnose and monitor cancer, infectious disease and neurological disorders. For more information, please visit http://www.aethlonmedical.com/ and connect with the Company on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Google+.

Certain statements herein may be forward-looking and involve risks and uncertainties.  Such forward-looking statements involve assumptions, known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of Aethlon Medical, Inc. to be materially different from any future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Such potential risks and uncertainties include, without limitation, that the ESI will not be able to commercialize its future products, that the FDA will not approve the initiation of the Company's clinical programs or provide market clearance of the company's products, future human studies whether revenue or non-revenue generating of the Aethlon ADAPT system or the Aethlon Hemopurifier® as an adjunct therapy to improve patient responsiveness to established cancer or hepatitis C therapies or as a standalone cancer or hepatitis C therapy or as a broad spectrum defense against viral pathogens, the Company's ability to raise capital when needed, the Company's ability to complete the development of its planned products, the Company's ability to manufacture its products either internally or through outside companies and provide its services, the impact of government regulations, patent protection on the Company's proprietary technology, the ability of the Company to meet the milestones contemplated in the DARPA contract as well as the ability of DARPA to fund the Company's portion of the contract, product liability exposure, uncertainty of market acceptance, competition, technological change, and other risk factors. In such instances, actual results could differ materially as a result of a variety of factors, including the risks associated with the effect of changing economic conditions and other risk factors detailed in the Company's Securities and Exchange Commission filings. The Company undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise.

Contacts:

James A. Joyce
Chairman and CEO
858.459.7800 x301
jj@aethlonmedical.com

Jim Frakes
Chief Financial Officer
858.459.7800 x300
jfrakes@aethlonmedical.com

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SOURCE Aethlon Medical, Inc.