Scientists in New Zealand have developed a new drug to fight previously untreatable hypoxic cancer tumours, which form in areas of the body starved of oxygen.
The researchers at the Auckland University have entered an agreement for the clinical development of CEN-209, which was developed over 10 years of research, said a statement from the university Tuesday.
CEN-209 was designed to enhance the effectiveness of radiotherapy and chemotherapy in solid hypoxic tumours, which were resistant to standard cancer therapies, said the statement. In lung cancer patients for example, about half of tumours had hypoxic regions.
The new drug worked by damaging the DNA of hypoxic cancer cells, while leaving normal, healthy tissues alone.
CEN-209 was designed and created by researchers at the university's Auckland Cancer Society Research Centre (ACSRC), using computer models of drug transport within tumours to accurately predict the anti-tumour activity of the drugs.
"Our computer models of drug transport developed in-house allowed the synthetic chemists to test their design theories and considerably shortened the discovery process," said Associate Professor Michael Hay, who led the ACSRC research chemists.
"CEN-209 improves markedly on previous agents in this class in terms of its ability to penetrate tumours, and this is reflected by its improved activity in the laboratory, when combined with long or short courses of radiotherapy," said researcher Professor Bill Wilson.
Under the agreement between the university's Auckland UniServices Ltd. and California-based Centella Therapeutics, Inc., a subsidiary of Varian Medical Systems, Inc., Centella will have exclusive rights to CEN-209, which it will develop and trial with Cancer Research UK.
The work on CEN-209 is the culmination of a program initiated with funding from the U.S. National Cancer Institute, and more recently from the Maurice Wilkins Centre for Biodiscovery. Ongoing preclinical research on CEN-209 and a backup compound was funded by grants from the Auckland Medical Research Foundation, Genesis Oncology Trust and Health Research Council of New Zealand, said the statement.