FarmaKology Newsletter - Issue #48

Jun 10, 2020

Today's Startup

BioXcel Therapeutics

BioXcel Therapeutics, Inc. is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focused on drug development that utilizes novel artificial intelligence to identify the next wave of medicines across neuroscience and immuno-oncology. The company's drug re-innovation approach leverages existing approved drugs and/or clinically validated product candidates together with big data and proprietary machine learning algorithms to identify new therapeutic indices. The company's two most advanced clinical development programs are BXCL501, a sublingual thin film formulation designed for acute treatment of agitation resulting from neurological and psychiatric disorders, and BXCL701, an immuno-oncology agent designed for treatment of a rare form of prostate cancer and for treatment of pancreatic cancer.

News

S'pore to start first human trial for drug to treat Covid-19

Singapore is starting its first human trial for a drug to treat Covid-19. A total of 23 healthy volunteers here have been selected to join a clinical safety trial for an antibody drug that is could potentially be a viable treatment for Covid-19 patients. The Phase 1 clinical safety trial will start next week and last some six weeks. The Health Sciences Authority granted approval for the trial on June 8. The biotech company, Tychan, is behind the treatment. This is the first time an in-human trial for a Covid-19 treatment medicine has been approved in Singapore. Tychan said in a statement on June 10 that it produced this antibody on Feb. 25.

First drugs announced in major COVID-19 drugs trial

Two UK drugs companies will be the first to partner with the Universities of Birmingham and Oxford as part of a major new UK drugs trial to test potential therapeutics to treat patients hospitalised with COVID-19. In what could be a significant development in the fight against the virus the CATALYST trial, which is a collaboration with University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust (UHB), will test a series of new drugs, including those already in use for patients with cancer and inflammatory diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis.

CSIR gets CDSCO’s approval for its anti-cancer drug IIIM-290

The Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) has reportedly given approval for a potential chemical entity developed by CSIR’s Indian Institute of Integrative Medicine (IIIM) in Jammu. This potent anti-cancer drug is anticipated to be effective for the treatment of pancreatic cancer after it successfully completes preclinical development and Investigational New Drug submission. This significant milestone has been achieved by a team of scientists including Sonali Bharate, Sandip Bharate, Shashi Bhushan, Dilip Mondhe, and Sumit Gandhi, complemented Dr. Shekhar Mande, the DG at CSIR.

Illumina Receives First FDA Emergency Use Authorization for a Sequencing-Based COVID-19 Diagnostic Test

Illumina, Inc. is paving the way for large-scale, next-generation sequencing-based COVID-19 testing. Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an Emergency Use Authorization for the Illumina COVIDSeq™ Test, a high-throughput, sequencing-based, in vitro diagnostic (IVD) workflow enabling the detection of SARS-CoV-2. The end-to-end workflow extends the options available for labs to scale diagnostic testing.