UAB spin-off enters the Nasdaq technology stock market
The US company ANEW Medical, a UAB spin-off with two gene therapy licences to stop the advancement of neurodegenerative diseases developed and patented by UAB researchers, will begin to trade on Nasdaq.
08/07/2024
The company ANEW Medical began to trade on the stock market in June, which will allow it to advance in the development of gene therapy strategies against Alzheimer's disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patented by researchers from the Institut de Neurociències at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (INc-UAB), the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the UAB, and the Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies (ICREA).
The licensed therapies are based on the anti-ageing protein Klotho, expressed by the gene of the same name. Researchers from the UAB groups, led by Miguel Chillón and Assumpció Bosch, have found in mice that the regulation of this protein has a neuroprotective, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, regenerative and promyelinating effect, all processes involved in neurodegenerative diseases.
Researchers have already applied gene therapy with Klotho in mice models of Alzheimer's disease with a treatment using vectors without replicative capacity, called adeno-associated viruses (AAV), administered to the brain or cerebrospinal fluid. The results obtained so far have shown a clinically important delay in the onset of these diseases. As an alternative to gene therapy, they also anticipate that it will work by administering the exogenous protein.
In the case of ALS, and in collaboration with Dr Xavier Navarro's group, they also managed to delay the pathological processes associated with neurodegeneration by providing sustained levels of the Klotho protein to motor neurons in muscle tissue, with a single dose administered in the circulatory system.
The agreement signed with ANEW has made it possible to accelerate the preclinical development of the strategy and to validate the results in different animal models with the secreted isoform of the gene. "The studies are having very promising results and we aim to find a new treatment that can reach clinical trials in humans," say Assumpció Bosch and Miguel Chillón.
Patents protecting these research results have already been granted in Europe, Canada, China and Hong Kong. Joseph Sinkule, CEO of ANEW Medical, emphasises: "We are convinced of the significant potential of this therapy and have therefore taken meticulous steps to protect and expand our licensed intellectual property in major world markets. These assets play a vital role in the development of innovative treatments for neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, Huntington's and ALS".