NOXXON Is Awarded Research and Development Grant for First-in-Human Clinical Trial with Spiegelmer NOX-A12
NOXXON Pharma AG announced that the company was awarded a research grant from Germany's Federal Ministry of education and Research (BMBF) under the ministry's small and medium enterprise innovation initiative ("KMU-Innovativ"). The grant was presented to NOXXON following the completion of a peer reviewed selection process. Under the initiative NOXXON will receive 1.2 million Euro (1.7 million US$) in funding for the impending phase I clinical development of its candidate Spiegelmer® NOX-A12. The company develops NOX-A12 for use in autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation in patients suffering from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma or multiple myeloma.
Spiegelmers® (L-aptamers) are chemical entities based on synthetic mirror-image oligonucleotides. Due to their unique mirror image configuration Spiegelmers® are not metabolized and do not hybridize with native nucleic acids. Spiegelmers® also do not activate the innate immune response via Toll-like receptors and have shown an exceptionally favorable immunogenicity profile in pre-clinical testing. The phase I clinical development of NOX-A12 will follow closely behind that of NOXXON's lead candidate NOX-E36, which entered human testing in June of 2009.
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