Just over a month after emerging from stealth and disclosing a $150 million series A, Korsana Biosciences Inc. is making the leap to the public market via a merger with Cyclerion Therapeutics Inc. The agreement, which is backed by a $370 million private placement from Korsana’s investors, solidly positions the newly merged company as it heads toward the clinic with KRSA-028, a next-generation shuttled antibody targeting amyloid beta for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, and builds out a pipeline of neurodegenerative disease candidates.
Researchers from Jiangsu Hengrui Pharmaceuticals Co. Ltd. and Shanghai Hengrui Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. have patented new sodium channel protein type 10 subunit α (SCN10A; Nav1.8) blockers that are potentially useful for the treatment of pain, urinary incontinence, multiple sclerosis, cough and arrhythmia.
Just over a month after emerging from stealth and disclosing a $150 million series A, Korsana Biosciences Inc. is making the leap to the public market via a merger with Cyclerion Therapeutics Inc. The agreement, which is backed by a $370 million private placement from Korsana’s investors, solidly positions the newly merged company as it heads toward the clinic with KRSA-028, a next-generation shuttled antibody targeting amyloid beta for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, and builds out a pipeline of neurodegenerative disease candidates.
Currently available disease management options for Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) are mostly symptomatic. Several strategies based on exon-skipping or gene transfer have been proposed to restore dystrophin expression, but can only address specific subsets of DMD patients and/or provide limited clinical benefits. Upregulating utrophin (UTRN), a structural and functional paralogue of dystrophin, has been proposed as an alternative therapeutic approach that may be suitable for all DMD patients, regardless of their genetic defect.
Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. is taking a neuroplastogen approach to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) through its planned $1.22 billion acquisition of Transcend Therapeutics Inc. The deal gives Tokyo-headquartered Otsuka access to Transcend’s lead asset, TSND-201, an oral neuroplastogen that has begun patient recruitment for a phase III study in the U.S.
Eli Lilly and Co. plans to buy Centessa Pharmaceuticals plc for $6.3 billion in up-front cash and another potential $1.5 billion through contingent value rights, gaining access to a pipeline of orexin receptor 2 agonists for sleep disorders. The Indianapolis-based pharma is re-entering a field that has multibillion-dollar potential and one that could emulate the success seen with its obesity program. Centessa, of Boston and London, has a lead candidate, cleminorexton (formerly ORX-750), with positive phase IIa data in narcolepsy types 1 and 2 and idiopathic hypersomnia.
Montclair State University and the University of Maryland have discovered new dual 3’,5’-cyclic-AMP and -GMP phosphodiesterase 11A4 (PDE11A4) inhibitors potentially useful for the treatment of cognitive disorders.
Marvel Biosciences Corp., together with its wholly owned subsidiary Marvel Biotechnology Inc., has announced nondilutive funding from the Alberta Innovates CarE (AICE) market access program to support progression into the clinic and phase I testing of lead compound, MB-204. MB-204, a fluorinated derivative version of istradefylline, offers potential as a new approach totreating autism spectrum disorders and related conditions, addressing socio-behavioral symptoms through a differentiated mechanism.
Certain cancers, such as triple-negative breast cancer, produce antibodies that, although they help fight the tumor, can cross the blood-brain barrier and alter the function of NMDA receptors (NMDAR) in the brain, which are essential for neuronal signaling. Scientists at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) have identified their origin and described how this process is linked to the maturation of these antibodies, which can activate or inhibit the receptor, causing neurological and psychiatric symptoms.
Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. is taking a neuroplastogen approach to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) through its planned $1.22 billion acquisition of Transcend Therapeutics Inc. The deal gives Tokyo-headquartered Otsuka access to Transcend’s lead asset, TSND-201, an oral neuroplastogen that has begun patient recruitment for a phase III study in the U.S.
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