Cortex Receives Additional AMPAKINE Patent
IRVINE, Calif., Oct. 1 /PRNewswire/ -- Cortex Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: CORX) today announced the issuance of U.S. Patent No. 5,783,587 entitled "Benzoyl Piperidines/Pyrrolidines for Enhancing Synaptic Response." This patent is the fifth to issue from a series of patents filed by Cortex and the University of California to protect the AMPAKINE(R) family of compounds and various medical uses of the compounds. Gary A. Rogers, Ph.D., Cortex's Vice President, Pharmaceutical Discovery, is a co-inventor on all of the issued patents.
"These patents demonstrate our leadership position and will help to protect our pioneering efforts as we continue to develop our understanding of how AMPAKINEs may be utilized for the improvement of central nervous system diseases and disorders," said Vincent F. Simmon, Ph.D., Cortex President and CEO. CX516, one of Cortex's AMPAKINEs, is currently being investigated in two separate clinical trials at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, MD, in patients with Alzheimer's disease and patients with schizophrenia. An additional study in patients with schizophrenia is underway at the Erich Lindemann Mental Health Center in Boston.
Cortex has completed a preliminary human safety study with a second generation AMPAKINE, CX691. This compound was designed to have a longer half life in humans, and the preliminary study has confirmed that it does. Furthermore, in a number of animal behavior assay systems, CX691 appears to be 50 to 100 times more potent than CX516 and has an impressive margin of safety.
Cortex, located in Irvine, California, is a neuroscience company focused on novel drug therapies for neurological and psychiatric disorders. The Company is pioneering a class of proprietary pharmaceuticals called AMPAKINEs, which act to increase the strength of signals at connections between brain cells. Aberrant neural connections or loss of these connections is believed to be responsible for the memory difficulties associated with Alzheimer's disease and to contribute to the memory and cognitive dysfunction seen in schizophrenia.
Health industry estimates indicate that more than four million Americans are victims of Alzheimer's disease, with that number expected to double over the next 20 years as the U.S. population ages. The worldwide incidence of schizophrenia is approximately one percent of the population. Treatment of patients with schizophrenia accounts for 2.5% of all U.S. health care costs and 75% of expenditures for mental health care.
Note - This press release contains forward-looking statements concerning the Company's research and development activities and business development plans. Actual results may differ materially, depending on a number of risk factors, including the risks that competitors may challenge or design around the Company's patents or develop competing technologies, that clinical studies may be suspended or take substantially longer than anticipated to complete and that the Company may be unable to arrive at corporate partnerships with larger pharmaceutical companies on acceptable terms and therefore be required to continue to fund clinical development of AMPAKINEs through the sale of additional equity securities or otherwise. As discussed in the Company's Securities and Exchange Commission filings, the Company's proposed products will require additional research and extensive and lengthy clinical testing. Regulatory approval will be required for the Company's proposed products, which may at any time be found to be toxic or ineffective for any or all of their proposed indications. CX516 is an investigational drug and has not yet been shown to have efficacy in the treatment of any disease.
SOURCE Cortex Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
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