Proteinqure Inc. has received regulatory clearances from the U.FDA and Health Canada to initiate a phase I trial of lead candidate, PQ-203. The trial will begin in Canada and expand to U.S. sites later in 2025. The FDA also granted PQ-203 fast track designation for triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC).
Characteristics of the tumor microenvironment are likely to contribute to the aggressiveness of triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) and the extremely poor prognosis of those who suffer it. By analyzing patterns of gene expression in cancer-associated fibroblasts from TNBC tumors, researchers in China identified the PLAU gene as a driver of aggressive phenotype.
The sialyltransferase ST6GAL1 is upregulated in several types of cancer and its expression is particularly elevated in triple-negative breast cancer, which is extremely aggressive and associated with very poor prognosis.
One of the functions of tumor-associated macrophages (TAMS) is to protect the tumor against the immune system, inhibiting T-cell engagement and reducing the efficacy of checkpoint inhibitors. Polyamidoamine hydroxyl dendrimers (HDs) target TAM without the need of a targeting ligand and are retained by TAMs for up to 1 month allowing radiation to deposit in the tumor.
Researchers from the National Cancer Institute and their collaborators have presented data regarding a MLK3-degrading PROTAC, CEP1347-VHL-02, for treating triple-negative breast cancer.
About 30%-40% of triple-negative breast cancers (TNBC) show HER2-low status and may benefit from the HER2-directed antibody-drug conjugate trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd). Ataxia-telangiectasia mutated (ATM) kinase plays a crucial role in double-strand break (DSB) repair response, thus inhibitors of ATM, such as AZD-1390, may enhance the effect of DSB inducers, resulting in DNA damage accumulation.
New and positive phase III cancer data for two monoclonal antibodies from two pharma giants opened the second day of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) conference this past weekend.
Biontech SE and Bristol Myers Squibb Co. are teaming up to develop Biontech’s BNT-327 in a deal possibly worth over $11 billion. BNT-327 is in the hot new class of bispecific antibodies targeting programmed death-1 (PD-1) or its ligand (PD-L1) and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF). The bispecifics take advantage of two well established mechanisms of action that help tumors grow; PD-1/PD-L1, which tells immunogenic T cells not to attack the tumor, and VEGF, which tumors excrete to produce new blood vessels to supply oxygen and other nutrients to the tumor.
