Backing for Bionomics Limited to Test Anti-Cancer Compound
Dr Deborah Rathjen, CEO and Managing Director of Bionomics said, “We are pleased that the CRC has chosen to support the discovery of inhibitors of BNO69 and we look forward to rapid progress of this program. Inhibitors of BNO69 will suppress the formation of new tumor blood vessels (angiogenesis) and inhibit tumor growth. There is a great market opportunity for such a drug if we consider that the blockbuster drug Avastin®, which also targets angiogenesis, had sales in 2006 of US$1.746 billion. BNO69 is a novel target and BNO69 inhibitors will be a new type of drug with this action. We have previously shown that BNO69 targeting has advantages over other angiogenesis drug targets because it operates at a point where two signaling pathways converge.”
Dr Rathjen further commented, “BNO69 was discovered four years ago using Bionomics Angene® platform technology and it has been shown to be a potent target for blocking breast cancer growth in preclinical studies in animal models and in laboratory assays. The BNO69 program complements our cancer drug candidate BNC105 which targets existing tumor blood vessels rather than the formation of new tumor blood vessels. BNC105 is on track to enter clinical trials later this year.”
BNO69 is a protein that is over-expressed in endothelial cells which line the walls of blood vessels within solid tumors. Inhibitors of BNO69 expression disrupt the function of endothelial cells in tumors and by doing so; inhibit the formation of new blood vessels within and around existing tumor vessels. These events result in tumor starvation and subsequent suppression of tumor growth.
Dr Gabriel Kremmidiotis, Bionomics’ VP Discovery Research said, “We are pleased that the CRC has given us the opportunity and resources to take the BNO69 project forward. Our past work has indicated that tumors treated with BNO69 gene-silencing molecules showed a reduction in size of over 75% compared to untreated tumors, in experiments conducted over 31 days. This result shows that inhibition of BNO69 expression has a profound effect on tumor growth and that BNO69 is potentially an effective drug target for treating breast cancer.”
The BN069 program supported by the CRC will involve a series of steps to identify, develop and optimise a drug candidate as a treatment for cancer. These steps include high throughput screening to identify an inhibitory compound that blocks the BNO69 target, medicinal chemistry and biological activity testing to further optimise compounds to derive a clinical candidate.