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Biotech / Medical : Regeneron Pharmaceuticals -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Biomaven who wrote (225)	3/29/1998 2:46:00 PM
From: Miljenko Zuanic	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3557

Hi Petyer: Exctract from REGN 10-K file: >> BDNF is currently being developed by Amgen-Regeneron Partners for potential use in treating ALS through two routes of administration: intrathecal (infusion into the spinal fluid through an implanted pump) and subcutaneous (injection under the skin). An intrathecal study in ALS patients is ongoing. Subcutaneous studies conducted by Regeneron on behalf of the partnership began in the first quarter of 1998. The current and planned future BDNF subcutaneous studies are intended to test whether the survival benefit seen in the retrospective analysis of the Phase III clinical trial can be confirmed through appropriate prospective trials. In addition, Sumitomo Pharmaceuticals Co., Ltd. ("Sumitomo Pharmaceuticals"), the Company's collaborator in the development of BDNF in Japan, has informed the Company that it will begin to conduct a Phase I safety assessment of BDNF delivered subcutaneously to normal volunteers in March 1998. Sumitomo Pharmaceuticals is initially developing BDNF to treat ALS.<< Note: Sumitomo will pay REGN 5 mm for BDNF development progress ! Combine this with last manuscript on BDNF: >>Nature 1997 Oct 23;389(6653):856-860 Anterograde transport of brain-derived neurotrophic factor and its role in the brain. Altar CA, Cai N, Bliven T, Juhasz M, Conner JM, Acheson AL, Lindsay RM, Wiegand SJ Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Tarrytown, New York 10591, USA. The role of neurotrophins as target-derived proteins that promote neuron survival following their retrograde transport from the terminals to the cell bodies of neurons has been firmly established in the developing peripheral nervous system. However, neurotrophins appear to have more diverse functions, particularly in the adult central nervous system. Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), for example, produces a variety of neuromodulatory effects in the brain that are more consistent with local actions than with long-distance retrograde signalling. Here we show that BDNF is widely distributed in nerve terminals, even in brain areas such as the striatum that lack BDNF messenger RNA, and that inhibition of axonal transport or deafferentation depletes BDNF. The number of striatal neurons that contain the calcium-binding protein parvalbumin was decreased in BDNF+/- and BDNF-/- mice in direct proportion to the loss of BDNF protein, which is consistent with anterogradely supplied BDNF having a functional role in development or maintenance. Thus the anterograde transport of BDNF from neuron cell bodies to their terminals may be important for the trafficking of BDNF in the brain.<< It appears that street do not beliewe to much on this perspective. :( Any thought? mz