Kosan Receives NCI Grant to Develop Production Method for Analogs of Promising Anti-Cancer Agent Discodermolide
HAYWARD, Calif., April 1 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Kosan Biosciences Incorporated (Nasdaq: KOSN - News) announced today the award of a two-year, $750,000 Phase II Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) grant from the National Cancer Institute to develop an efficient means of producing analogs of the polyketide discodermolide, a promising potential anti-cancer agent. Kosan currently is evaluating discodermolide analogs in preclinical studies with the goal of initiating clinical development in 2005.
"The goal of this work is to use Kosan's genetic engineering technology to gain access to complex polyketide fragments and then assemble them using a short chemical sequence to make discodermolide analogs," said David C. Myles, Ph.D., Kosan's Executive Director of Chemistry and the grant's principal investigator. "This strategy will provide Kosan with material that is produced more efficiently and cost-effectively than analogs made by total chemical synthesis, an important consideration as we advance the program toward clinical evaluation and potentially commercialization."
Discodermolide has been demonstrated by Kosan and others to have the ability to inhibit cancer cells by the same mechanism as paclitaxel (the active ingredient in Taxol®) and the epothilones, while also exhibiting activity against paclitaxel-resistant tumors. Discodermolide has broad spectrum anti-tumor activity and is a potent inhibitor of paclitaxel and epothilone-resistant tumors in cell culture and in animal models.
Initially isolated from a deep-sea marine sponge, discodermolide is extremely scarce, and the amounts obtainable from the sponge are limited. Like most other polyketides, chemical synthesis of discodermolide is extremely complicated and expensive. Kosan has used proprietary technology to enable the production of other scarce polyketides with high potential pharmaceutical value, including Kosan's epothilone and geldanamycin analog clinical products... |
