Iconix Establishes Toxicity Markers and Predictive Signatures Using DrugMatrix
Drug Signatures(TM) to Be Reviewed at Third Annual Predictive Toxicology Meeting
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., June 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Iconix Pharmaceuticals, Inc., the industry pioneer in chemogenomics, today announced that DrugMatrix(TM), its chemogenomics prediction system, has been successfully used to identify predictive biomarkers comprised of key genes and protein targets associated with toxicity and pathology. These biomarkers, which Iconix terms Drug Signatures(TM), represent leading edge examples of the power of chemogenomics-a new field that integrates genomics and chemical technologies for improved target validation and drug optimization.
Iconix's Drug Signatures were derived using the Company's extensive chemogenomic information repository on paradigm drug and toxicant molecules. The Drug Signatures form the basis for predictive models of toxicity and activity developed by Iconix scientists to assist drug discovery scientists in the early screening and prioritization of lead compounds and drug candidates for further development. These achievements will be presented at the CBI Third Annual Predictive Toxicology meeting held in Philadelphia, PA, June 13-14, 2002.
The development of Iconix's DrugMatrix system and predictive toxicology Drug Signatures are part of a larger initiative at Iconix to understand the chemogenomic basis for drug mechanism, pharmacology and toxicity. Iconix is the only organization -- commercial or public -- to study the entire drug universe of paradigm drugs and toxicants, and to generate and analyze chemogenomic profiles on these molecules using technologies including gene expression microarrays, molecular pharmacology assays and protein pathway maps. Iconix's efforts have included an early focus on toxicogenomics, a subset of the chemogenomics field, as a foundation for predicting potential human toxicity in compounds at the research stage.
Jim Neal, Iconix's Chief Executive Officer, commented on the success of Iconix's predictive toxicology program by saying, "The level of excitement at Iconix and our industry partners over our recent toxicology-based modeling achievements is very gratifying. Among the greatest costs in drug development are those associated with compounds that looked promising early on but failed for toxicity reasons in the more advanced and expensive stages of preclinical and clinical development. Our success developing predictive Drug Signatures shows that the historical constant of high failure rates in modern drug discovery can be addressed for the first time, and is a striking indication of how much the pharmaceutical industry will advance in the coming years."
Iconix's predictive toxicology models allow the Company's scientists to rank order compounds by their potential level of toxicity, characterize the type of target organ pathology and toxicity endpoints compounds are likely to produce in vivo, and categorize research molecules by comparison to the hundreds (and soon thousands) of paradigm reference compounds and their known toxicological and pharmacological profiles. This predictive toxicology approach, and the Iconix chemogenomics platform of which it is a part, represents the first industry initiative to broadly understand the basis for drug toxicity and efficacy for accelerated and more cost-effective drug discovery and development.
Iconix's Drug Signature toxicology modeling capability works by identifying common toxicity markers, which are genes and protein targets responsible for toxic responses as measured by Iconix's experimental studies conducted on thousands of tissue samples and molecular pharmacology assays treated with thousands of drugs and known toxicants. These studies currently include analysis in liver, kidney, bone marrow, spleen, heart, brain and intestine organ models-areas of particular concern to drug designers for toxic and other side effects that can end a drug development program. Representative Drug Signatures from these efforts include models of cholestasis, peroxisome proliferation, and DNA damage, as well as organ damage associated with classes of drugs such as the statins, azole anti-fungals, and others. Iconix's current chemogenomic information bank comprises over 600 profiled paradigm drugs and toxicants, 97,000 tissue samples from compound-treated animals, 425 extensive compound/tissue expression experiments and 100,000 molecular pharmacology screens.
Iconix's presentation during the CBI Predictive Toxicology meeting will focus on the development of the DrugMatrix platform, Iconix's novel integration of multiple data types (including large-scale gene expression and molecular pharmacology data domains), methods used to discover and analyze predictive Drug Signatures and case studies demonstrating the power of the predictive toxicology approach.
Iconix Pharmaceuticals develops integrated technologies that allow life science researchers to discover drug candidates for novel therapeutic targets and predict the potential efficacy, toxicity and other side effects of drug candidates at the earliest stages of drug discovery. Iconix also maintains internal drug discovery and development programs based on novel targets resulting from genomic studies. Iconix has established a portfolio of collaborators to advance its chemogenomic product development initiatives, including Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT - News) and its Biochip Systems Division, Incyte Genomics, Inc. (Nasdaq: INCY - News), the MDS Pharma Services business of MDS Inc. (Toronto: MDS - News; NYSE: MDZ - News), and Essential Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: ETRX - News) For more information, visit Iconix's web site at www.iconixpharm.com.
SOURCE: Iconix Pharmaceuticals, Inc. |
