prostate cancer treatment. Dr Rupinder Kanwar and her husband Professor Jagat Kanwar, along with two others, revealed that by piggy backing a chemotherapy drug onto a wellknown milk protein could create a combination that is lethal for cancer cells without the toxic side-effects.
When coupled with the milk protein lactoferrin, the Dox can be delivered directly into the nucleus of prostate cancer cells and will kill the cells as well as drug resistant cancer stem cells, without any side-effects. This has been published in the prestigious international journal, Nature.
According Dr Rupinder Kanwar, a senior research fellow with the Deakin Medical School’ s Centre for Molecular and Medical Research, doctors had stopped using Dox to treat prostate cancer because of the side-effects. She said,“ Dox is used widely for treating several types of cancers and known for causing toxicity to heart, brain, kidneys and leading to cardiac arrest / heart failure.”
Dr Rupinder points towards the fact that the prostate cancer is one of the few cancers where chemotherapy is not the primary treatment. This is because these particular cancer cells are able to flush out the drug and become resistant to it, while the administered Dox continues to kill off the body’ s normal cells resulting in a range of side effects, the most damaging of which is heart failure, she says.
Lactoferrin is an iron-binding protein found in cow milk and human milk. It is known for its immune boosting and antimicrobial properties making it an important part of the body’ s protection against infection. It is also added as a key ingredient in baby formula. It is lactoferrin’ s ability as an iron transporting protein to mop up much needed iron for growth of microbes( bacteria and parasites) from the site of infection and its cancer cell killing activities that are exploited by the Deakin scientists to create an anticancer bio-drug that has no sideeffects and improves the immune system.
MITRA BIOTECH RAISES $ 27.4 MILLION IN SERIES B FUNDING
Mitra Biotech, the fast growing biotech company based in Boston, and with a significant research and laboratory presence in Bangalore, has raised $ 27.4 million( approximately Rs 184 crore) in a Series B round of financing led by Sequoia India and Sands Capital Ventures.
Other investors such as RA Capital Management and the company’ s existing investors Accel Partners and Tata Capital Innovations Fund also participated in the round. Sequoia and Sands Capital will get board seats. The latest round also provided an exit to Series A investors KITVEN and India Innovation Fund.
Mitra will use the funds to expand the availability of its CANScript service, which predicts personalized responses to cancer treatments and has demonstrated an extremely high correlation to actual clinical response, the company said.
“ These new funds will allow us to enhance our technology and engage in new studies to further demonstrate CANScript’ s clinical utility. We will also move forward with our commercial efforts in the United States, as well as emerging and other key markets,” mentioned Mr Mallikarjun Sundaram, president, cofounder, and chief executive of Mitra in his quote to the media platforms.
Earlier in October 2013, Tata Capital Innovations Fund along with existing investors India Innovation Fund and Accel Partners, invested about Rs 40 crore in the company. In 2010, the company had raised funding of Rs 30 crore from Accel, India Innovation Fund and KITVEN, a governmentbacked fund.
VYOME BIOSCIENCES RAISES $ 14 MILLION FRESH FUNDING
Vyome Biosciences, known as a clinical-stage specialty biopharmaceutical company developing novel medicines for treating skin diseases caused by resistant microbes has closed $ 14 million Series C financing round. This financing round was led by Perceptive Advisors, a leading New York-based life sciences fund and, Romulus Capital, a Boston-based venture capital firm, along with participation from existing investors including Kalaari Capital, Sabre Partners and Aarin Capital.
biotech
" We are very excited to announce the closure of our Series C financing. The support from leading global and leading life investors and the continued support from our largest existing shareholders validates our Company ' s strategy, science and development programs. The Company will utilize these funds predominantly to advance the clinical development of its lead product, VB 1953 and will allow us to completion of important milestones of clinical results. In addition, the Company will continue to advance the development of other proprietary products pipeline in the preclinical stage ", said Venkateswarlu Nelabhotla( N. Venkat), Co-Founder and CEO, Vyome Biosciences.
" Vyome is well positioned as a clinical stage company with a rich pipeline to becoming a leader in antimicrobial resistance and treatment of skin infections with the new funding round. This influx of funding also validates our hypothesis that innovationdriven R & D can attract top global investors ", remarked Dr Shiladitya Sengupta, Co-Founder of Vyome and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.
According to the American Academy of Dermatology, Acne represents the most common skin disease, affecting 85 % of teenagers and affects 40-50 million people in the US. Approximately 40 % of acne patients are suffering from antibiotic resistance. Physicians around the world have cited a large unmet need for new, improved topical therapy options, vis-à-vis the current available topical products. Vyome ' s VB 1953 targets this potential USD 2 Billion market of antibiotic resistant acne. VB 1953 had its IND( Investigational New Drug) application accepted by the US FDA recently, and the company will soon be initiating clinical studies in USA.
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