Eyenuk Inc. is significantly extending the scope of its artificial intelligence system for the automatic analysis of retinal images, adding the diagnosis of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and glaucoma to the EU approved uses of Eyeart AI.
Ocuphire Pharma Inc. is marching ahead despite falling short of the primary endpoint in top-line data from the Zeta-1 phase II study testing oral APX-3330 in diabetic retinopathy (DR). The trial did not achieve its goal with regard to the percentage of patients with a ≥2-step improvement in Diabetic Retinopathy Severity Score at week 24 in the study eye. Ocuphire plans to schedule an end-of-phase II meeting with the U.S. FDA to review the results.
Thirona BV spun out its retina division into a stand-alone business, Thirona Retina BV, focused exclusively on the eye disease market, effective Jan. 1, 2023. The development comes after the recent expansion of Retcad, Thirona’s flagship solution for eye disease screening. Thirona BV will continue to develop artificial intelligence (AI)-driven systems for precision medicine in lung disease.
Earlysight SA is developing a novel ophthalmology device that can be used to diagnose certain degenerative eye disorders long before onset of first symptoms. Earlysight and researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) have reported positive results for their first clinical trial of Cellularis in the journal Ophthalmology Science.
The U.S. FDA has given the green light to Aeye Health Inc. for its autonomous diagnostic screening system for diabetic retinopathy. The Aeye Diagnostic Screening (Aeye-DS) uses artificial intelligence (AI) to diagnose the eye condition from retinal images captured by a fundus, or retinal, camera.
Newco Breye Therapeutics ApS is poised to repurpose an intravenously administered drug that failed in ischemia reperfusion injury as an orally available treatment for diabetic retinopathy, after closing a €4 million (US$4.1 million) seed round.
Highly targeted light therapy delivered via a sleep mask has been shown to arrest the progress of diabetic retinopathy, and in some cases to improve visual acuity.
Surrozen Inc.’s back-end-loaded deal with Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH for the preclinical frizzled class receptor 4 agonist SZN-413 takes aim at vascular function in retinal diseases. The arrangement brings an up-front payment to South San Francisco-based Surrozen of $12.5 million, plus up to $586.5 million in potential development, regulatory and commercial milestone rewards, along with mid-single-digit to low-double-digit royalties on sales. After an initial period of joint research, Boehringer, of Ingelheim, Germany, will take over development and commercial responsibilities.
A Surrozen Inc. research team has reported preclinical data for the novel frizzled class receptor 4 (FZD4) agonist, SZN-413, being evaluated for the treatment of diabetic retinopathy. In vitro studies using the Norrin mimetic (SZN-413-p) revealed that SZN-413-p induced Wnt/β-catenin signaling and upregulated blood-brain barrier/blood-retina barrier gene expressions in endothelial cells.
