Novacta Therapeutics Achieves 1st Milestone From Wellcome Trust's Strategic Translational Award For A New Treatment For C. Difficile Infection

Main Category: Infectious Diseases / Bacteria / Viruses
Also Included In: Immune System / Vaccines
Article Date: 07 Oct 2008 - 4:00 PDT

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Novacta Therapeutics, the anti-infectives development arm of Novacta Biotech, announces that it has successfully achieved the first milestone in a strategic translational award received from the Wellcome Trust to develop a new drug to treat Clostridium difficile (C. difficile) infections.

The achievement of this significant milestone triggers the second tranche of a £3.5 million award granted in January 2008. Novacta will enter the selected drug candidate NVB302 into formal preclinical development. The end goal is for Novacta to progress the programme to human clinical studies.

C. difficile infections (CDIs) are a growing and serious problem, associated with twice as many deaths in UK hospitals last year as MRSA. Cases of CDIs, which occur in the lower digestive tract, rose by 22 per cent in the past year and affected more than 15,500 people over 65 in the first quarter of 2007. New anti-infective drugs are needed to target C. difficile without depleting other beneficial bacteria in the gut.

Novacta is developing novel, naturally-derived products known as 'lantibiotics' as first-in-class drugs for treating hospital acquired infections caused by C. difficile. Early preclinical data indicate that the product shows promise as an effective treatment by acting selectively to kill C. difficile with less disturbance of normal gut bacteria than with existing drugs, predicting that the drug has a good recurrence prognosis. Recurrence of the disease is the central problem to any C. difficile anti-bacterial therapy. In addition, exploratory data have demonstrated that the drug is safe and well-tolerated.

Ted Bianco, Director of Technology Transfer at the Wellcome Trust, said: 'The increasing incidence of C. difficile infections poses a serious challenge to those entrusted with the care of individuals at risk, both in the hospital and care-home environments. New treatments are needed, as well as effective means of prevention. The Wellcome Trust is delighted to be contributing to this effort by supporting the exciting work being progressed by Novacta.'

Dr Tony Sedgwick, Novacta's Chief Executive Officer, commented, 'This is a major step for Novacta, as it not only validates the company's platform of proprietary lantibiotic variants, but also allows us to fully fund the programme to the point of entering clinical trials. The early preclinical data have already shown the potential and safety of the programme and we look forward to progressing it into the clinic. With existing therapies being only suboptimal and only few developed compounds in the pipeline, Novacta is well positioned to be the first on the market with a novel and effective treatment against C. difficile.'

About Novacta Therapeutics

Novacta Therapeutics is the newly formed anti-infectives development arm of UK-based biotechnology company Novacta Biotech.

Novacta Therapeutic's lead programmes are centred around a novel class of small peptide molecules called lantibiotics, which have until now been underexploited due to the lack of adequate research tools. Novacta has three programmes based around first-in-class optimised lantibiotic variants. Its novel approach has been validated by the Wellcome Trust's strategic translational award for its lead programme in C.difficile associated infection.

Novacta Biotech's other arm, known as Novacta Biosystems, is focused on providing revenue generating services to industry customers. Novacta was established in 2003 and currently employs about 25 people at its premises in Welwyn, Hertfordshire. For more information, go to http://www.novactabio.com.

About lantibiotics

Lantibiotics are a naturally occurring class of antibiotic peptide compounds found in a large number of bacteria. They take their name from the lanthionine amino acids found within their structure (lanthionine-containing antibiotics). Lantibiotics have demonstrated potential to treat infections caused by agents such as C. difficile and MRSA. Conventional medicinal chemistry has been unable to manipulate the structure of the naturally occurring compounds into the optimised forms that have the potential to treat human disease. However, Novacta's proprietary technologies allow the structural manipulation and optimisation of activity which is necessary to unlock the potential of this novel and under-exploited class of compounds.

About The Wellcome Trust

The Wellcome Trust is the largest charity in the UK. It funds innovative biomedical research, in the UK and internationally, spending around £600 million each year to support the brightest scientists with the best ideas. The Wellcome Trust supports public debate about biomedical research and its impact on health and wellbeing.

The Wellcome Trust