Inflammasome Therapeutics is a science based company founded to develop therapies for prevalent, degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease, multiple sclerosis, macular degeneration, and Parkinson's disease.
The precise causes of these diseases are unknown, however, they share many of the same risk factors, such as, smoking, obesity, hypertension, and age. They all are multifactorial diseases with multiple biochemical factors, many shared, contributing to their progression.
The Role of Inflammasomes
It is now recognized that these diseases are all characterized by upregulation of the inflammatory process, driven by prolonged activation of inflammasomes. Inflammasomes are intracellular multiprotein complexes that help trigger and maintain the inflammatory response normally as part of the innate immune system. However, in Alzheimer’s disease, multiple sclerosis, macular degeneration, and Parkinson's disease, inflammasomes become chronically activated, causing the continual release of inflammatory elements such as caspase-1, IL-18, and IL-1β, which in turn cause progressive tissue damage and disease progression.
Inflammasome Therapeutics’ focus is on reducing the dysregulation of the inflammatory process by preventing aberrant inflammasome activation.
This represents a new approach to these diseases. To date, the main strategy in developing new therapies for Alzheimer’s and geographic atrophy has been to focus on attacking a single, causal element. Typically this has been amyloid β for Alzheimer’s disease and various forms of complement for geographic atrophy. These attempts have all failed in large-scale clinical trials. We believe that targeting a single factor may not be optimal when multiple factors are present.
The multiple elements elevated in tissues of patients with geographic atrophy (Amyloid β, complement, Alu RNA, iron) have a common feature, they all cause or are products of inflammasome activation. In pre-clinical models of these diseases, administration of these factors initiates inflammasome activation and disease symptoms. Further, inhibition of inflammasome activation effectively treats these diseases in animal models.
Kamuvudines
We have identified and licensed a series of molecules, Kamuvudines, that successfully inhibit inflammasome activation in cell culture and animal models. Inflammasome Therapeutics is poised to initiate clinical trials of our lead compounds in the near future.
In 2014, our co-Founder’s lab first reported in the journal Science that some of the existing FDA-approved drugs used in the treatment of HIV and hepatitis B are powerful inhibitors of inflammasome activation. These molecules, nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs), have been approved for decades.
We have found NRTIs to be highly effective in multiple pre-clinical models of the inflammasome mediated diseases macular degeneration and type 2 diabetes. Further, by analyzing health claim data bases of over 100,000,000 people in the US, we have found that patients taking NRTIs for HIV or hepatitis B have a highly significant reduced risk of developing Alzheimer's disease, geographic atrophy, type 2 diabetes, and multiple sclerosis than well matched patients who do not take these drugs.
Unfortunately, the side effects of NRTIs (primarily mitochondrial toxicity) precludes their use in any but the most serious, life-threatening, conditions such as HIV infection or hepatitis B. This toxicity is due to the intracellular metabolism of the drugs and is not related to their activity against inflammasome activation (but is key to their anti-viral properties).
Kamuvudines are chemical derivatives of NRTIs that have the same anti-inflammasome activity than the parent molecules yet cannot undergo the same metabolism and have no detectable mitochondrial toxicity. In multiple pre-clinical tests they have been found to be over 1,000 times less toxic than their parent molecules and to be highly effective against macular degeneration and type 2 diabetes.
Patents
We strive to maintain and expand a robust intellectual property estate for our drug candidate and drug delivery assets. The early work in Kamuvudines was conducted in Dr. Ambati’s laboratory at the University of Kentucky, and we have an exclusive worldwide license to the patents arising from that work from the University of Kentucky Research Foundation. These patents cover use of NRTIs and Kamuvudines for Dry AMD, GA, Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, and diabetes. Thirteen of these patents have been issued in the US and other countries and additional patents are in application.
We have also developed new IP covering the administration of these compounds to the eye as sustained release depot formulations. Patent applications on this technology are being filed.
Our Co-Founders
After graduating from Johns Hopkins University at 17 years of age, Jayakrishna Ambati has gone on to become one of the world’s leading authorities on degenerative diseases. He teamed up with Paul Ashton, who has developed four new drugs through to FDA approval, to found Inflammasome Therapeutics. Their desire to build a company combining scientific excellence with solid developmental expertise is reflected in the makeup of the Board of Directors:
- Mary Weber, Esq. is a former senior partner at Ropes and Gray.
- Balamurali Ambati, graduated Mount Sinai Medical School at 17 years of age and is now a respected ocular surgeon and entrepreneur.
- Joon Youb Lee is CEO of a pharmaceutical company.
- Napoleone Ferrara is the recipient of both the Lasker-DeBakey Award and the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences for his work in developing two multi-billion dollar therapies: Avastin (cancer) and Lucentis (wet macular degeneration).