« Return to News | R&D Trends

CellCentric selects Sygnature Discovery for epigenetic prostate cancer program

Monday, September 9, 2013 12:01 PM

Sygnature Discovery, a provider of integrated drug discovery services, has been selected by CellCentric, a biotechnology company with a scientific foundation in epigenetics, to progress small molecule inhibitor drug discovery against a specific deubiquitinase (DUB) enzyme which has been demonstrated to play a key role in the progression of prostate cancer.

CellCentric recently received $6.7 million through further venture investment and an award from the U.K. government-backed Technology Strategy Board’s BioMedical Catalyst Fund to further fuel the DUB program through to small molecule clinical candidates.  The new agents act upon the androgen receptor (AR) pathway, which is gaining interest from the pharmaceutical industry. CellCentric’s approach has the potential to modulate AR and AR splice variants, which could be key to overcoming many of the drug resistance mechanisms that limit the clinical benefit of existing approved and developmental therapeutic agents.

Dr. Simon Hirst, chief executive officer, Sygnature Discovery, said, “Epigenetics is a rapidly evolving field and this is an opportunity for us to work on an unexplored and challenging drug target.  Sygnature has considerable in-house oncology drug discovery knowledge and having medicinal chemistry, computational chemistry and in vitro screening under one roof will enable us to accelerate CellCentric’s prostate cancer program toward the clinic.”

Share:          
CLINICAL TRIAL RESOURCES

Search:

NEWS ONLINE ARCHIVE

Browse by:

CWWeekly

September 30

Novartis-Walgreens pilot study blurring the line between retail pharmacy, investigative site

CISCRP to launch traveling science museum exhibit to demystify clinical trial participation

Already a subscriber?
Log in to your digital subscription.

Subscribe to CWWeekly.

The CenterWatch Monthly

October

New growth and decline in Asia clinical trials
South Korea, Japan, China see big growth in 1572s, while India posts huge drop

Harnessing Big Data to transform clinical trials
From protocol to patient recruiting, data analytics can yield valuable insights

Already a subscriber?
Log in to your digital subscription.

Purchase the October issue.

Subscribe to
The CenterWatch Monthly.

The CenterWatch Monthly

September

Sponsors look to collaborate on comparator drugs
Co-therapies, comparators are in 60% of studies, cost $25m per company a year

Early adopters implement risk-based monitoring pilot programs
Experiments aim to offer long-term solutions, despite short-term uncertainties

Already a subscriber?
Log in to your digital subscription.

Purchase the September issue.

Subscribe to
The CenterWatch Monthly.

JobWatch centerwatch.com/jobwatch

Featured Jobs

More Jobs

 

Copyright © 1995-2013 CenterWatch.