18 January 2024
The high-impact Nature Portfolio journal Oncogene has published peer-reviewed data highlighting the anti-cancer effects of Medannex’s first-in-class therapeutic agent, MDX-124.
The paper reports collaborative research between Chris Parris and his team at the School of Life Sciences, Anglia Ruskin University (ARU), Professor Chris Pepper (Brighton and Sussex Medical School) and UK biotech company Medannex, which developed the first-in-class monoclonal antibody therapy.
MDX-124 targets annexin-A1, an immunomodulatory protein which is overexpressed in several cancer types, and promotes tumour progression. High annexin-A1 expression levels correlate with poorer overall survival in various cancers with considerable unmet clinical need, including triple-negative breast, pancreatic, colorectal and prostate.
The Oncogene publication shows that MDX-124 significantly reduces cancer proliferation in a dose-dependent manner across a panel of human cancer cell lines expressing annexin-A1. This anti-proliferative effect is achieved by arresting cell cycle progression, with cancer cells accumulating in the G1 phase.
Furthermore, MDX-124 is shown to significantly inhibit tumour growth in in vivo models of triple-negative breast and pancreatic cancer, indicating that annexin-A1-targeted therapy represents a viable and innovative approach to cancer treatment.
The Phase Ib clinical study of MDX-124 (‘ATTAINMENT’) is underway to establish the safety and optimum dose of the novel therapy. Its clinical efficacy will then be evaluated in newly-diagnosed cancer patients, in combination with standard-of-care treatments.
Professor Parris, Head of the School of Life Sciences at Anglia Ruskin University (ARU), said: ‘The recent publication in Oncogene represents a highly successful collaboration between academia and the pharmaceutical industry. We are very proud of this high-impact publication and are gratified that we have helped Medannex bring MDX-124 into a first-in-human clinical study. We look forward to continuing our successful collaboration with Medannex.’
Medannex Director of Scientific Operations, Dr Fiona Dempsey, who co-authored the paper, said: ‘We are delighted to publish this work with our collaborators demonstrating the anti-cancer potential of our innovative antibody therapeutic and look forward to the clinical data coming out of the ATTAINMENT study in due course.’
The Oncogene paper can be accessed here: https://rdcu.be/dvBrc
Details of the ATTAINMENT clinical study can be accessed here: https://www.isrctn.com/ISRCTN78740398