RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C., Jan. 8, 2008 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- Icagen, Inc. (Nasdaq:ICGN) today provided an update relating to the clinical development of senicapoc, a novel orally available small molecule inhibitor of the KCa3.1 potassium ion channel. Specifically, the Company announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has accepted its Investigational New Drug (IND) submission for senicapoc as a potential treatment for asthma. The company's IND submission was supported by a growing body of data linking KCa3.1 to immune cell activation and cellular proliferation and efficacy data from a recently completed study that demonstrated the ability of senicapoc to reverse the antigen induced changes in late phase airway resistance and airway hyper-reactivity in a sheep model of asthma.
