OMD this is such exciting news! Thanks to a new $2 million investment, a drug that spurs cancer cells to self-destruct, while sparing healthy cells, is on the road to human clinical trials.
The compound, known as PAC-1, is still in the early stages of development, and must pass toxicological tests in two species, as well as other pharmacology toxicity testing, before it can be tried in human subjects. So far though, it has proven safe and has promising anti-cancer effects in cell culture, in mouse models of cancer, and in pet dogs with spontaneously occurring lymphomas and osteosarcomas.
Tim Fan, Professor of Veterinary Clinical Medicine at the University of Illinois Veterinary Teaching Hospital, and coordinator of clinical trials of the drug in canine patients says, “The new investment is the outgrowth of years of testing and development of PAC-1, and derivative compounds in dogs with naturally occurring cancers. In addition to paving the way for the human trial, we have helped many veterinary patients that would not have otherwise received treatments for their cancer.”
Again, just so it’s clear, dogs used in the testing of PAC-1 were not laboratory animals with induced cancer, but rather pets from the community with spontaneously occurring cancers.
If PAC-1 makes it through the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Investigational New Drug review, the first human clinical trial (Phase I) of the drug will begin in mid-2014, with the clinical work being conducted at the University of Illinois Cancer Center in Chicago.
“The trial is going to be geared toward brain cancer patients,” said University of Illinois chemistry professor Paul Hergenrother, who discovered PAC-1’s anti-cancer capabilities in 2006 and has been refining and testing it ever since. “One of the unusual features of this drug is that it does get into the brain, which most cancer drugs do not. So we want to embrace that and try to address the unmet clinical need of brain cancer.”
Told you it was exciting news! To read additional information about the study, please visit Drug Discovery & Development, and for more information on the canine clinical trial, please visit the University of Illinois Veterinary Teaching Hospital’s clinical trials web page. Let’s Stick It To Canine Cancer!
