Ubiquitin pathway. Source: Rogerdodd, English language Wikipedia

On April 1, 2014, Forma Therapeutics (Watertown MA) announced that it had entered into an expanded strategic collaboration with Celgene (Summit, NJ).

Under the new agreement, Forma has received an upfront cash payment of $225 million. The initial collaboration between the two companies under the new agreement will be for 3 1⁄2 years. Celgene will also have the option to enter into up to two additional collaborations with terms of two years each for additional payments totaling approximately $375 million. Depending on the success of the collaborations and if Celgene elects to enter all three collaborations, the combined duration of the three collaborations may be at least 7 1⁄2 years.

Under the terms of the new agreement, Forma will control projects from the research stage through Phase 1 clinical trials. For programs selected for licensing, Celgene will take over clinical development from Phase 2 to commercialization. Forma will retain U.S. rights to these products, and Celgene will have the rights to the products outside of the U.S. For products not licensed to Celgene, FORMA will maintain worldwide rights.

During the term of the third collaboration, Celgene will have the exclusive option to acquire Forma, including the U.S. rights to all licensed programs, and worldwide rights to other wholly owned programs within Forma at that time.

The April 2013 agreement between Forma and Celgene

The new collaboration between Forma and Celgene builds on an earlier agreement between the two companies. On April 29, 2013, the two companies entered into a collaboration aimed at discovery, development, and commercialization of drug candidates to modulate targets involved in protein homeostasis.

Protein homeostasis, also known as proteostasis, involves a tightly regulated network of pathways controlling the biogenesis, folding, transport and degradation of proteins. The ubiquitin pathway (illustrated in the figure above) is one of these pathways. We recently discussed how the ubiquitin pathway is involved in the mechanism of action of thalidomide and lenalidomide (Celgene’s Thalomid and Revlimid).

Targeting protein homeostasis has application to discovery and development of drugs for oncology, neurodegenerative disease, and other disorders. However, the April 2013 Forma/Celgene agreement focused on cancer. Under that agreement, Forma received an undisclosed upfront payment. Upon licensing of preclinical drug candidates by Celgene, Forma was to be eligible to receive up to $200 million in research and early development payments. FORMA was also to be eligible to receive $315 million in potential payments based upon development, regulatory and sales objectives for the first ex-U.S. license, as well as  up to a maximum of $430 million per program for further licensed products, in addition to post-sales royalties.

On October 8, 2013, Forma announced that it had successfully met the undisclosed first objective under its April 2013 strategic collaboration agreement with Celgene. This triggered an undisclosed payment to Forma. Progress in the April 2013 collaboration was an important basis for Celgene’s decision to enter into a new, broader collaboration with Forma a year later.

The scope of the new April 2014 Forma/Celgene collaboration

Unlike the April 2013 agreement, the April 2014 agreement between Forma and Celgene is not limited to protein homeostasis, or to oncology. The goal of the new collaboration is to “comprehensively evaluate emerging target families for which Forma’s platform has exceptional strength” over “broad areas of chemistry and biology”.  The expanded collaboration will thus involve discovery and development of compounds to address a broad range of target families and of therapeutic areas.

According to Celgene’s Thomas Daniel, M.D. (President, Global Research and Early Development), Celgene’s motivation for signing the new agreement is based not only on the early success of the existing Forma/Celgene collaboration, but also on “emerging evidence of the power of Forma’s platform to generate unique chemical matter across important emerging target families”.

According to Forma’s President and CEO, Steven Tregay, Ph.D., the new collaboration with Cegene enables Forma to maintain its autonomy in defining its research strategy and conducting discovery through early clinical development. It also aligns Forma with Celgene’s key strengths in hematology and in inflammatory diseases.

Forma Therapeutics in Haberman Associates publications

We have been following Forma on the the Biopharmconsortium Blog since July 2011. At that time, I was a speaker at Hanson Wade’s World Drug Targets Summit (Cambridge, MA). At that meeting, Mark Tebbe, Ph.D. (then Vice President, Medicinal and Computational Chemistry at Forma) was also a speaker. At the conference, Dr. Tebbe discussed FORMA’s technology platforms, which are designed to be enabling technologies for discovery of small-molecule drugs to address challenging targets such as protein-protein interactions (PPIs).

In particular, Dr. Tebbe discussed Forma’s Computational Solvent Mapping (CS-Mapping) platform, which enables company researchers to interrogate PPIs in intracellular environments, to define hot spots on the protein surfaces that might constitute targets for small-molecule drugs. FORMA has been combining CS-Mapping technology with its chemistry technologies (e.g., structure guided drug discovery, diversity orientated synthesis) for use in drug discovery.

We also discussed Forma’s earlier fundraising successes as of January 2012, and cited Forma as a “built to last” research-stage platform company in an interview for Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN).

Finally, we discussed Forma and its technology platform in our book-length report, Advances in the Discovery of Protein-Protein Interaction Modulators, published by Informa’s Scrip Insights in 2012. (See also our April 25, 2012 blog article.)

In our report, we discussed Forma as a company that employs “second-generation technologies” for the discovery of small-molecule PPI modulators. This refers to a suite of technologies designed to overcome the hurdles that stand in the way of the accelerated and systematic discovery and development of PPI modulators. Such technologies are necessary to make targeting of PPIs a viable field.

Forma’s website now has a brief explanation of its drug discovery engine, as it is applied to targeting PPIs. This includes links to web pages describing:

• CS-Map technology
• Forma’s compound libraries, based in part on diversity-oriented synthesis
• Cell-based high-throughput screening (HTS) technologies
• Forma’s high speed solution phase parallel synthesis and purification platform. This platform provides Forma with the potential to perform medicinal chemistry at an extremely accelerated pace.

Our 2012 book-length report discusses technologies of these types, as applied to discovery of PPI modulators, in greater detail than the Forma website.

According to Dr. Daniel: “Progress in our existing [protein homeostasis] collaboration, coupled with emerging evidence of the power of FORMA’s platform to generate unique chemical matter across important emerging target families” led Celgene to enter into its new, expanded collaboration with Forma in April 2014. This suggests that Celgene is especially impressed by Forma’s chemistry and chemical biology platforms. it also suggests that chemistry technology platforms developed to address PPIs may be applicable to areas of drug discovery beyond PPIs as well.

Concluding remarks

Despite the enthusiasm for Forma and its drug discovery engine shown by Celgene, Forma’s other partners, and various industry experts, it must be remembered that Forma is still a research-stage company. The company has not one lone drug candidate in the clinic, let alone achieving proof-of-concept in humans. It is clinical proof-of-concept, followed by Phase 3 success and approval and marketing of the resulting drugs, that is the “proof of the pudding” of a company’s drug discovery and development efforts.

We await the achievement of such clinical milestones by Forma Therapeutics.

From a business strategy point of view, we have discussed Forma’s efforts to build a stand-alone, independent company for the long term in this blog and elsewhere. Now Forma has entered into an agreement with Celgene that might—in around 7-10 years—result in Forma’s acquisition. This would seem to contradict Forma’s “built to last” strategy.

However, in the business environment that has prevailed over the past several years, several established independent biotech companies, notably Genentech and Genzyme, have been acquired by larger companies. Even several Big Pharmas (e.g., Schering-Plough and Wyeth) have been acquired.

Nevertheless, we do not know what the business environment in the biotech/pharma industry will be like in 7-10 years, despite the efforts of strategists to predict it. And Celgene might forgo its option to acquire Forma, for any number of reasons. So the outlook for Forma’s status as an independent or an acquired company (which also depends on its success in developing drugs) is uncertain.

As the producers of this blog, and as consultants to the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, Haberman Associates would like to hear from you. If you are in a biotech or pharmaceutical company, and would like a 15-20-minute, no-obligation telephone discussion of issues raised by this or other blog articles, or of other issues that are important to  your company, please contact us by phone or e-mail. We also welcome your comments on this or any other article on this blog.

Ikaros. Source © Marie-Lan Nguyen / Wikimedia Commons

Thalidomide is a notorious drug that was approved in Europe in the late 1950s for use as a sedative, but was withdrawn in the early 1960s after the drug caused thousands of devastating birth defects. The FDA did not approve thalidomide at that time. However, beginning in the late 1990s, thalidomide has been repurposed and rehabilitated, provided that proper precautions are maintained to prevent its use in pregnant women and women who may become pregnant.

Currently, thalidomide (under the brand name Thalomide) is marketed by Celgene (Summit, NJ) mainly as a treatment for multiple myeloma (MM) and of a certain form of leprosy. Celgene has also been developing derivatives of thalidomide, the most important of which are lenalidomide (Celgene’s Revlimid) and pomalidomide (Celgene’s Pomalyst). All three agents are now approved in the U.S. and in Europe. Although lenalidomide and pomalidomide are more potent in treating MM and have fewer adverse effects than thalidomide, they are still teratogenic (as determined by animal studies), and are available only in a restricted distribution setting to avoid their use during pregnancy.

Celgene calls thalidomide and its derivatives “immunomodulatory drugs” (IMiDs). Until recently, their mechanism of action was poorly understood. IMiDs were found to have a wide range of activities, including antiangiogenic activity, induction of oxidative stress, upregulation of interleukin-2 (IL-2) production by activated T cells, inhibition of proinflammatory cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), and stimulation of natural killer (NK) cells. It is thalidomide’s antiangiogenic activity that appears to be responsible for its teratogenic effects.

However, it was the antiangiogenic activity of thalidomide that gave rise to the hypothesis that this agent might be used to treat MM. MM is a B-cell malignancy that involves the proliferation of abnormal plasma cells, which accumulate in the bone marrow.  In MM, the intimate interaction between the plasma cells and bone marrow stromal cells results in induction of the angiogenic factor vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) as well as the MM survival factor IL-6. Disruption of this interaction would reduce the induction of new blood vessels and of IL-6, thus decreasing tumor growth and survival. When tested against MM, thalidomide—and later lenalidomide and other IMiDs—were found to be effective in controlling MM, as predicted by the hypothesis.

However, as of 2010, researchers found that although IMiDs are indeed antiangiogenic, that is not the mechanism that explains their therapeutic effect. Now—in 2014—two papers were published in Science that expand upon that earlier effort and identify that pathway by which IMiDs work against MM. These studies were by Krönke et al. and Lu et al. The studies were led, respectively, by Benjamin L. Ebert, M.D., Ph.D. and William G. Kaelin Jr., M.D., both at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute (Boston, MA). These two papers were accompanied by a brief Perspective by A. Keith Stewart, M.B., CH.B., of the Mayo Clinic (Scottsdale, AZ), in the same issue of Science (17 January, 2014).

The key to understanding the pathway by which lenalidomide (the drug that was used in both of the 2014 research studies) and other IMiDs work against MM is the finding that that they bind to an intracellular protein known as cereblon (CRBN). In a 2010 study, Astellas researchers and their academic collaborators demonstrated that thalidomide binds to zebrafish CRBN. Treatment of zebrafish with CRBN morpholinos or thalidomide caused fin defects, reminiscent of the limb defects seen with thalidomide in the 1960s.

As also demonstrated in the 2010 study, CRBN forms an E3 ubiquitin ligase complex with three other proteins—damaged DNA binding protein 1 (DDB1), Cullin-4A (CUL4A), and regulator of cullins 1 (Roc1). The complex is known as the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase.

E3 ubiquitin ligases carry out the terminal step of the ubiquitin pathway—specific attachment of ubiquitin (and via repeated steps, ubiquitin chains) to substrate proteins. Attachment of ubiquitin (and especially of ubiquitin chains) to substrate proteins can tag them for destruction  by the proteasome.

Lu et al. and Krönke et al. showed that lenalidomide binding to CRBN results in the selective ubiquitination and proteasomal degradation of two lymphoid transcription factors, IKZF1 and IKZF3, by the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase.  IKZF1 and IKZF3 are Ikaros family zinc finger proteins 1 and 3 (IKZF1 and IKZF3); they are also known, respectively as Ikaros and Aiolos.

Although IKZF1 is highly expressed in early lymphoid progenitors, studies in mice have shown that IKZF3 is required for the generation of plasma cells, which are the physiologic counterparts of MM cells. Both Krönke et al. and Lu et al. studied the roles of IKZF1 and IKZF3 via RNAi knockdown and other methods. Inhibition of IKZF1 or IKZF3 expression inhibited growth of lenalidomide-sensitive MM cell lines, but lenalidomide-insensitive cell lines were not affected. Downregulation of either IKZF protein in these cell lines led to loss of the other. Downregulation of IKZF1 and IKZF3 resulted in a decrease in interferon regulatory factor 4 (IRF4) and IRF4 mRNA, consistent with IRF4 acting downstream of IKZF1 and/or IKZF3 in lenalidomide-sepsitive MM cells. Previous studies have shown that IRF4 inhibition is toxic for MM cells.

In addition to its effects on MM cells, lenalidomide treatment also upregulates IL-2 expression in T cells. Since IKZF3 binds the IL-2 gene promoter and represses IL-2 transcription in T cells, Lu et al. and Krönke et al. investigated whether lenalidomide’s effects on IL-2 expression in T cells might work via the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase-IKZF1/3 pathway. They found that RNAi knockdown of CRBN abrogated the effect of lenalidomide on IL-2 expression. They further found that lenalidomide treatment caused marked decreases in IKZF1 and IKZF3 protein levels In primary human T cells. Finally, they showed that RNAi knockdown of IKZF3 or IKZF1 induced IL-2 expression and repressed further response to lenalidomide. These studies thus show that lenalidomide indeed works via the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase-IKZF1/3 pathway to upregulate IL-2 in T cells.

Thus IMiDs, working via the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase-IKZF1/3 pathway, downregulate IRF4 in MM cells, resulting in cell death. They also upregulate IL-2 in T cells. A diagram of the pathway is given in Dr. Stewart’s Perspective.

The studies of Krönke et al. and Lu et al. have greatly advanced our understanding of the mechanism of action of IMiDs in MM. As pointed out by Krönke et al., other B cell malignancies against which lenalidomide has activity, such as mantle cell lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia, also exhibit high IKZF3 expression. Celgene is testing lenalidomide against chronic lymphocytic leukemia and other cancers in the clinic, and the drug is approved for treatment of myelodysplastic syndromes in Europe, in addition to MM. So the recent studies of the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase-IKZF1/3 pathway may also apply to other cancers for which lenalidomide is being developed.

Nevertheless, there are still gaps in our understanding of the mechanism of action of IMiDs. For example, the proteasomal inhibitor bortezomib (Millennium’s Velcade) is used to treat MM. Combination therapies of bortezomib and lenalidomide have shown efficacy in early clinical trials, and further trials are continuing. This creates an apparent paradox, because proteasomal blockade prevents the destruction of IKZF1 and IKZF3 by lenalidomide via the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase-IKZF1/3 pathway. Lu et al. hypothesize that since proteasomal inhibition by bortezomib is incomplete with therapeutic dosing, this might allow sufficient destruction of IKZF1 and IKZF3 while retaining bortezomib’s other therapeutic effects. Alernatively, they hypothesize that IKZF1 and IKZF2, once polyubiquitylated, may be inactive or act as dominant-negatives.

Implications for drug discovery

The most immediate implications of these findings is that they might be used to discover novel, more effective and safer modulators of the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase-IKZF1/3 pathway as therapies for MM and other B cell malignancies. Such efforts might include finding a non-teratogenic modulator of this pathway, since thalidomide-CRBN-mediated teratogenicity may be mediated by substrates other than Ikaros family proteins in different cellular lineages.

Moreover, the 2010 zebrafish study suggested that thalidomide’s teratogenic effects are due to a loss of function of cereblon. In contrast, the 2014 studies in MM indicate that the therapeutic effects of the IMiDs reflect a cereblon gain of function. This supports the possibility of finding non-teratogenic modulators of the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase-IKZF1/3 pathway.

The studies of Krönke et al. and Lu et al. may have wider implications for the targeting of E3 ubiquitin ligases in drug discovery for other diseases. We have discussed the possibility of targeting E3 ubiquitin ligases in our 2012 book-length report, Advances in the Discovery of Protein-Protein Interaction Modulators, published by Informa’s Scrip Insights.

The ubiquitin system is a fundamental regulatory system in all eukaryotic cells, comparable in importance to protein phosphorylation. In recent years, researchers have discovered and developed numerous important agents that modulate protein phosphorylation pathways, namely the protein kinase inhibitors. However, there as yet are very few approved and experimental drugs that modulate the ubiquitin system. Most are proteasome inhibitors, which indirectly target this system. The approved agent, bortezomib, has achieved blockbuster status despite its nonspecificity and limited field of application.

Despite the central importance of the ubiquitin system, there are only a handful of compounds that directly target it in clinical trials.

The reason that drug discovery of ubiquitin system-targeting drugs has lagged behind, for example, the discovery and development of protein kinase inhibitors is that modulating the ubiquitin system involves targeting protein-protein interactions (PPIs). Nevertheless, our 2012 report discusses novel technologies and strategies that might be applied to the discovery of PPI modulators.

As discussed in our April 25, 2012 article on this blog, there has been new interest in the discovery of PPIs by leading biotech/pharma companies in recent years, motivated by the development of these technologies and of the increasing strategic importance of PPI modulator development.

As we discussed in our 2012 report, the greatest drug discovery opportunity in the ubiquitin cascade is in targeting E3 ubiquitin ligases. That is because as one moves down the ubiquitinylation cascade, the degree of specificity of the process increases. There are over 600 E3 ubiquitin ligases encoded in the human genome, each of which targets its own specific class of proteins. Moreover, the total number of ubiquitin cascade enzymes encoded by the human genome is greater than the number of protein kinases.

As discussed by Krönke et al., their study (and that of Lu et al.) reveals that the small-molecule drug lenalidomide modulates the activity of the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase complex to increase ubiquitination of two transcription factors, IKZF1 and IKZF3. It does so by specific binding to one component of the system, cereblon. This was found serendipitously—not by either classical or advanced technologies for discovering PPI modulators. Moreover, the targets of the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase, IKZF1 and IKZF3, are transcription factors that act by forming PPIs. They are also involved in the complex process of chromatin remodeling, and the nature of their interactions are poorly understood. They are therefore considered “undruggable.”

Nevertheless, researchers can screen for compounds that bind cereblon, and which thus modulate the CRBN-CRL4 ubiquitin ligase. Might it also be possible to screen for compounds that modulate one component of other E3 ubiquitin ligases, and thus increase the interactions between these ligases and their specific substrates? If so, this might provide a novel means to discover drugs that modulate the ubiquitin system.

As the producers of this blog, and as consultants to the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, Haberman Associates would like to hear from you. If you are in a biotech or pharmaceutical company, and would like a 15-20-minute, no-obligation telephone discussion of issues raised by this or other blog articles, or of other issues that are important to  your company, please contact us by phone or e-mail. We also welcome your comments on this or any other article on this blog.

Happy New Year! Source: Roblespepe. http://bit.ly/1cpkyHX

As it does every year, Science published its “Breakthrough of the Year” for 2013 in the 20 December 2013 issue of the journal.

Science chose cancer immunotherapy as its Breakthrough of the Year 2013.

In its 20 December 2013 issue, Science published an editorial by its Editor-in-Chief, Marcia McNutt, Ph.D., entitled “Cancer Immunotherapy”. The same issue has a news article  by staff writer Jennifer Couzin-Frankel, also entitled “Cancer Immunotherapy”.

As usual, the 20 December 2013 issue of Science contains a Breakthrough of the Year 2013 news section, which in addition to the Breakthrough of the Year itself, also contains articles about several interesting runners-up, ranging from genetic microsurgery using CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeat) technology to mini-organs to human cloning to vaccine design.

In the Science editorial and news article, the authors focus on the development and initial successes of two types of immunotherapy:

• Monoclonal antibody (MAb) drugs that target T-cell regulatory molecules, including the approved CTLA4-targeting MAb ipilimumab (Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Yervoy), and the clinical-stage anti-PD-1 agents nivolumab (Bristol-Myers Squibb) and lambrolizumab (Merck).
• Therapy with genetically engineered autologous T cells, known as chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) therapy, such as that being developed by a collaboration between the University of Pennsylvania and Novartis.

The rationale for Science’s selection of cancer immunotherapy as the breakthrough of the year is that after a decades-long process of basic biological research on T cells, immunotherapy products have emerged and–as of this year–have achieved impressive results in clinical trials. And–as pointed out by Dr. McNutt–immunotherapy would constitute a new, fourth modality for cancer treatment, together with the traditional surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy.

However, as pointed out by Dr. McNutt and Ms. Couzin-Frankel, these are still early days for cancer immunotherapy. Key needs include the discovery of biomarkers that can help predict who can benefit from a particular immunotherapy, development of combination therapies that are more potent than single-agent therapies, and that might help more patients, and means for mitigating adverse effects.

Moreover, it will take some time to determine how durable any remissions are, especially whether anti-PD1 agents give durable long-term survival. Finally, although several MAb-based immunotherapies are either approved (in the case of  ipilimumab) or well along in clinical trials, CAR T-cell therapies and other adoptive immunotherapies remain experimental.

In addition to the special Science “Breakthrough 2013” section, Nature published a Supplement on cancer immunotherapy in its 19/26 December 2013 issue. This further highlights the growing importance of this field.

Cancer immunotherapy on the Biopharmconsortium Blog

Readers of our Biopharmconsortium Blog are no strangers to recent breakthroughs in cancer immunotherapy. In the case of MAb-based immunotherapies, we have published two summary articles, one in 2012 and the other in 2013. These articles noted that cancer immunotherapy was the “star” of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting in both years.

Our blog also contains articles about CAR therapy, as being developed by the University of Pennsylvania and Novartis and by bluebird bio and Celgene. Moreover, the Biopharmconsortium Blog contains articles on other types of cancer immunotherapies not covered by the Science articles, such as cancer vaccines.

We look forward to further progress in the field of cancer immunotherapy, and to the improved treatments and even cures of cancer patients that may be made possible by these developments.

As the producers of this blog, and as consultants to the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, Haberman Associates would like to hear from you. If you are in a biotech or pharmaceutical company, and would like a 15-20-minute, no-obligation telephone discussion of issues raised by this or other blog articles, or of other issues that are important to  your company, please contact us by phone or e-mail. We also welcome your comments on this or any other article on this blog.

Agios Efstratios, Greece. Source: Christef http://bit.ly/HK636F

In a news release on September 23, 2013, Agios Pharmaceuticals (Cambridge, MA) announced that it had initiated its first clinical study. The company further discussed its early clinical and preclinical programs in its press release on its Third Quarter financial report, dated November 7, 2013.

Specifically, the company initiated a Phase 1 muticenter clinical trial of AG-221 in patients with advanced hematologic malignancies bearing an isocitrate dehydrogenase 2 (IDH2) mutation. The study is designed to evaluate the safety, pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics and efficacy of orally-administered AG-221 in this patient population. The first stage of the Phase 1 study is a dose-escalation phase, which is designed  to determine the maximum tolerated dose and/or the recommended dose to be used in Phase 2 studies. After the completion of this phase, several cohorts of patients will receive AG-221 to further evaluate the safety, tolerability and clinical activity of the maximum tolerated dose.

We discussed AG-221 in our June 17, 2013 article on this blog. AG-221 is an orally available, selective, potent inhibitor of the mutated IDH2 protein. It is thus a targeted (and personalized) therapy for patients with cancers with an IDH2 mutation.

As we summarized in our June 17, 2013 article, wild-type IDH1 and IDH2 catalyze the NADP+-dependent oxidative decarboxylation of isocitrate to α-ketoglutarate. Mutant forms of IDH1 and IDH2, which are found in certain human cancers, no longer catalyze this reaction, but instead catalyzes the NADPH-dependent reduction of α-ketoglutarate to R(-)-2-hydroxyglutarate (2-HG). Agios researchers hypothesized that 2HG is an oncometabolite. They further hypothesized that developing mutant-specific small molecule inhibitors of IDH1 and IDH2 might inhibit the growth or reverse the oncogenic phenotype of cancer cells that carry the mutant enzymes.

As we further discussed in our article, Agios researchers published two articles in the journal Science in May 2013 that support these hypotheses. The researchers showed that drugs that inhibit the mutant forms of IDH1 and IDH2 can reverse the oncogenic effects of the mutant enzymes in patient-derived tumor samples. These results constitute preclinical support for the hypothesis that the two mutant enzymes are driving disease, and that drugs that target the mutant forms of the enzymes can reverse their oncogenic effects.

In the results reported in one of these research articles, Agios researchers tested a mutant-IDH2 inhibitor in hematologic malignancies (including one model leukemia and one patient-derived leukemia), and showed that treatment with the inhibitor caused differentiation of the leukemic cells to normal blood cells. This preclinical study thus supports the initiation of Agios’ new Phase 1 study of AG-221 in patients with mutant-IDH2 bearing hematologic malignancies.

Additional pipeline news in Agios’ Third Quarter 2013 Report

In addition to the report of the initiation of Phase 1 studies of AG-221, Agios reported  that it had advanced AG-120, a mutant-IDH1 inhibitor, toward Investigational New Drug (IND) filing. The company plans to initiate Phase 1 clinical trials of AG-120 in early 2014, in  patients with advanced solid and hematological malignancies that carry an IDH1 mutation.

Agios also reported in their Third Quarter 2013 Report that the company had advanced AG-348 into IND-enabling studies. AG-348 is an activator of pyruvate kinase R (PKR). Germline mutation of PKR can result in pyruvate kinase deficiency (PK deficiency), a form of familial hemolytic anemia. Agios’ in vitro studies indicate that PKR activators can enhance the activity of most common PKR mutations, and suggest that these compounds may be potential treatments for PK deficiency.

Agios’ AG-348 program is part of its R&D aimed at development of treatments for inborn errors of metabolism (IEM). We discussed this program in our November 30, 2011 article on this blog.

Agios to present preclinical research at the ASH meeting in December 2013

In a second November 7, 2013 press release, Agios announced that it would present the results of the preclinical studies of its lead programs in cancer metabolism and in IEM at the 2013 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting, December 7-10, 2013 in New Orleans, LA.

Agios researchers will give one presentation on a study of AG-221 treatment in a primary human IDH2 mutant bearing acute myeloid leukemia (AML) xenograft model. They will also present two posters–one on a mutant-IDH1 inhibitor in combination with Ara-C (arabinofuranosyl cytidine) in a primary human IDH1 mutant bearing AML xenograft model, and another on the effects of a small molecule activation of pyruvate kinase on metabolic activity in red cells from patients with pyruvate kinase deficiency-associated hemolytic anemia.

Can Agios Pharmaceuticals become a new Genentech?

On October 13, 2013, XConomy published an article on Agios’ CEO, David Schenkein. The article is entitled “David Schenkein, Cancer Doc Turned CEO, Aims to Build New Genentech”.

As many industry experts point out, the business environment is much different from that in which Genentech (and Amgen, Genzyme and Biogen) were founded, and grew to become major companies. As one illustration of the difference between the two eras, neither Genentech nor Genzyme are independent companies today. Biogen exists as a merged company, Biogen Idec, which between 2007 and 2011 had to fend off attacks by shareholder activist Carl Icahn.

Moreover, this has been the era of the “virtual biotech company”. These are lean companies with only a very few employees that outsource most of their functions, and that are designed to be acquired by a Big Pharma or large biotech company. The virtual company strategy has been designed to deal with the inability of most young biotech companies to go public in the current financial environment. (However, there has been a surge in biotech IPOs in the past year, including Agios’ own IPO on June 11, 2013. So it is possible that the environment for young biotech companies going public is changing.)

Nevertheless, the XConomy article states that when Dr. Schenkein was in discussions with venture capitalist Third Rock on becoming the CEO of one of their portfolio companies, he stated that he wanted “a company with a vision, and investor support, to be a long-term, independent company”. As we have discussed in this blog, and also in an interview for Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), Agios’ strategy is to build a company that can endure as an independent firm over a long period of time, and that can also demonstrate sustained performance. This strategy has been characterized (especially in the 1990s and early 2000s) as “Built to Last”, a term that I used in the interview.

Later, Agios posted a reprint of the C&EN article on its website, which it retitled “Built to Last”. This illustrates Agios’ commitment to “Built to Last”, as is more importantly shown by the company’s financial and R&D strategy.

Even if Agios cannot become the next Genentech, it–as well as a few other young platform companies mentioned in the CE&N article–might become an important biotech or pharmaceutical company like Vertex. However, all depends on the success of Agios’ products in the clinic and at regulatory agencies like the FDA, as well as the future shape of the corporate, financial and health care environment.

As the producers of this blog, and as consultants to the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, Haberman Associates would like to hear from you. If you are in a biotech or pharmaceutical company, and would like a 15-20-minute, no-obligation telephone discussion of issues raised by this or other blog articles, or an initial one-to-one consultation on an issue that is key to your company’s success, please contact us by phone or e-mail. We also welcome your comments on this or any other article on this blog.

CXCR-1 N-terminal peptide bound to IL-8

In our October 31, 2013 blog article, we discussed recent structural studies of the chemokine receptors CCR5 and CXCR4. We discussed the implications of these studies for the treatment of HIV/AIDS, especially using the CCR5 inhibitor maraviroc (Pfizer’s Selzentry/Celsentri). As discussed in the article, researchers are utilizing the structural studies of CCR5 and CXCR4 to develop improved HIV entry inhibitors that target these chemokine receptors.

Meanwhile, other researchers have been studying the role of chemokine receptors in cancer biology, and the potential use of chemokine receptor antagonists in cancer treatment.

CCR5 antagonists as potential treatments for metastatic breast cancer

One group of researchers, led by Richard G. Pestell, M.D., Ph.D. (Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA) has been studying expression of CCR5 and its ligand CCL5 (also known as RANTES) and their role in breast cancer biology and pathogenesis. Their report of this study was published in the August 1, 2012 issue of Cancer Research.

These researchers first studied the combined expression of CCL5 and CCR5 in various subtypes of breast cancer, by analyzing a microarray database of over 2,000 human breast cancer samples. (The database was compiled from 27 independent studies). They found that CCL5/CCR5 expression was preferentially expressed in the basal and HER-2 positive subpopulations of human breast cancer.

Because of the high level of unmet medical need in treatment of basal breast cancer, the authors chose to focus their study on this breast cancer subtype. As the researchers point out, patients with basal breast cancer have increased risk of metastasis and low survival rates. Basal tumors in most cases do not express either androgen receptors, estrogen receptors (ERs), or HER-2. They thus cannot be treated with such standard receptor-targeting breast cancer therapeutics as tamoxifen, aromatase inhibitors, or trastuzumab. The only treatment options are cytotoxic chemotherapy, radiation, and/or surgery. However, these treatments typically results in early relapse and metastasis.

The basal breast cancer subpopulation shows a high degree of overlap with triple-negative (TN) breast cancer. We discussed TN breast cancer, and research aimed at defining subtypes and driver signaling pathways, in our August 2, 2011 article on this blog. In that article, we noted that TN breast cancers include two basal-like subtypes, at least according to one study. Other researchers found that 71% of TN breast cancers are of basal-like subtype, and that 77% of basal-like tumors are TN. A good part of the problem is that there is no accepted definition of basal-like breast cancers, and how best to define such tumors is controversial. However, both the TN and the basal subpopulations are very difficult to treat and have poor prognoses. It is thus crucial to find novel treatment strategies for these subpopulations of breast cancer.

Dr. Pestell and his colleagues therefore investigated the role of CCL5/CCR5 signaling in three human basal breast cancer cell lines that express CCR5. They found that CCL5 promoted intracellular calcium (Ca2+) signaling in these cells. The researchers then determined the effects of CCL5/CCR5 signaling in promoting in vitro cell invasion in a 3-dimensional invasion assay. For this assay, the researchers assessed the ability of cells to move from the bottom well of a Transwell chamber, across a membrane and through a collagen plug, in response to CCL5 as a chemoattractant. The researchers found that CCR5-positive cells, but not CCR5-negative cells, showed CCL5-dependent invasion.

The researchers then studied the ability of CCR5 inhibitors to block calcium signaling and in vitro invasion. The agents that they investigated were maraviroc and vicriviroc. Maraviroc (Pfizer’s Selzentry/Celsentri) is the marketed HIV-1 entry inhibitor that we discussed in our October 31, 2013 article.  Vicriviroc is an experimental HIV-1 inhibitor originally developed by Schering-Plough. Schering-Plough was acquired by Merck in 2009. Merck discontinued development of vicriviroc because the drug failed to meet primary efficacy endpoints in late stage trials.

Pestell et al. found that maraviroc and vicriviroc inhibited calcium responses by 65% and 90%, respectively in one of their CCR5-positive basal cell breast cancer lines, and gave similar results in another cell line. The researchers then found that  in two different CCR5-positive basal breast cancer cell lines, both maraviroc and vicriviroc inhibited in vitro invasion.

The researchers then studied the effect of maraviroc in blocking in vivo metastasis of a CCR5-positive basal cell breast cancer line, which had been genetically labeled with a fluorescent marker to facilitate noninvasive visualization by in vivo bioluminescence imaging (BLI). They used a standard in vivo lung metastasis assay, in which cells were injected into the tail veins of immunodeficient mice, and mice were treated by oral administration with either maraviroc or vehicle. The researchers then looked for lung metastases. They found that maraviroc-treated mice showed a significant reduction in both the number and the size of lung metastases, as compared to vehicle-treated mice.

In both in vitro and in vivo studies, the researchers showed that maraviroc did not affect cell viability or proliferation. In mice with established lung metastases, maraviroc did not affect tumor growth. Maraviroc inhibits only metastasis and homing of CCR5-positive basal cell breast cancer cells, but not their viability or proliferation.

As the result of their study, the researchers propose that CCR5 antagonists such as maraviroc and vicriviroc may be useful as adjuvant antimetastatic therapies for breast basal tumors with CCR5 overexpression.  They may also be useful as adjuvant antimetastatic treatments for other tumor types where CCR5 promotes metastasis, such as prostate and gastric cancer.

As usual, it must be emphasized that although this study is promising, it is only a preclinical proof-of-principle study in mice, which must be confirmed by human clinical trials.

In an October 25, 2013 Reuters news story, it was revealed that Citi analysts believe that Merck will take vicriviroc into the clinic  in cancer patients in 2014. Citi said that it expected vicriviroc to be tested in combination with “a Merck cancer immunotherapy” across multiple cancer types, including melanoma, colorectal, breast, prostate and liver cancer. (We discussed Merck’s promising cancer immunotherapy agent lambrolizumab/MK-3475 in our June 25, 2013 blog article. But the Merck agent to be tested together with vicriviroc was not disclosed in the Reuters news story.)

Despite this news story, Merck said that it had not disclosed any plans for clinical trials of vicriviroc in cancer.

The CXCR1 antagonist reparixin as a potential treatment for breast cancer

In our In April 2012 book-length report, “Advances in the Discovery of Protein-Protein Interaction Modulators” (published by Informa’s Scrip Insights), we discussed the case of the allosteric chemokine receptor antagonist reparixin (formerly known as repertaxin). Reparixin has been under developed by Dompé Farmaceutici (Milan, Italy). This agent targets both CXCR1 and CXCR2, which are receptors for interleukin-8 (IL-8). IL-8 is a well-known proinflammatory chemokine that is a major mediator of inflammation. As we discussed in our report, reparixin had been in Phase 2 development for the prevention of primary graft dysfunction after lung and kidney transplantation. However, it failed in clinical trials.

Meanwhile, researchers at the University of Michigan (led by Max S. Wicha, M.D., the Director of the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center) and at the Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM) in France were working to define a breast cancer stem cell signature using gene expression profiling. They found that CXCR1 was among the genes almost exclusively expressed in breast cancer stem cells, as compared with its expression in the bulk tumor.

IL-8 promoted invasion by the cancer stem cells, as demonstrated in an in vitro invasion assay. The CXCR1-positive, IL-8 sensitive cancer stem cell population was also found to give rise to many more metastases in mice than non-stem cell breast tumor cells isolate from the same cell line. This suggested the hypothesis that a CXCR1 inhibitor such as reparixin might be used as an anti-stem cell, antimetastatic agent in the treatment of breast cancer.

Dr. Wicha and his colleagues then studied the effects of blockade of CXCR1 by either reparixin or a CXCR1-specific blocking antibody on  bulk tumor and cancer stem cells in two breast cancer cell lines. The researchers found in in vitro studies that treatment with either of these two CXCR1 antagonists selectively depleted the cell lines of cancer stem cells (which represented 2% of the tumor cell population in both cell lines).

This depletion was followed by the induction of massive apoptosis of the bulk, non-stem tumor cells. This was mediated via a bystander effect, in which CXCR1-inhibited stem cells produce the soluble death mediator FASL (FAS ligand). FASL binds to FAS receptors on the bulk tumor cells, and induces an apoptotic pathway in these cells that results in their death.

In in vivo breast cancer xenograft models, the researchers treated tumor-bearing mice with either the cytotoxic agent docetaxel, reparixin, or a combination of both agents. Docetaxel treatment–with or without reparixin–resulted in a significant inhibition of tumor growth, while reparixin alone gave only a modest reduction in tumor growth. However, treatment with docetaxel alone gave no reduction (or an increase) in the percentage of stem cells in the tumors, while reparixin–either alone or in combination with docetaxel–gave a 75% reduction in the percentage of cancer stem cells. Moreover, in in vivo metastasis studies in mice, reparixin treatment gave a major reduction in systemic metastases. These results suggest that reparixin may be useful in eliminating breast cancer stem cells and in inhibiting metastasis and thus preventing recurrence of cancer in patients treated with chemotherapy.

As we discussed in our 2012 report, Dr. Wicha’s research on reperixin might represent an opportunity for Dompé to repurpose reperixin for cancer treatment. Since the publication of the 2012 report, Dompé has been carrying out a Phase 2 pilot study of reparixin in patients diagnosed with early, operable breast cancer, prior to their treatment via surgery. The goal of this study is to investigate if cancer stem cells decrease in two early breast cancer subgroups (estrogen receptor-positive and/or progesterone receptor positive/HER-2-negative, and estrogen receptor negative/progesterone receptor negative/HER-2-negative). The goal is to compare any differences between the two subgroups in order to better identify a target population.

Dompé has thus begun the process of clinical evaluation of reparixin for the new indication–treatment of breast cancer in order to inhibit metastasis and prevent recurrence.

Conclusions

Researchers have found promising evidence that at least two chemokine/chemokine receptor combinations may be involved in cancer stem cell biology and thus in the processes of metastasis and cancer recurrence. In at least one case–and perhaps both–companies are in the early stages of developing small-molecule chemokine receptor antagonists for inhibiting breast cancer metastasis and recurrence. Such a strategy might be applicable to other types of cancer as well.

As discussed by Wicha et al., in immune and inflammatory processes, chemokines serve to facilitate the homing and migration of immune cells. In the case of cancer, chemokines may act as “stemokines”, by facilitating the homing of cancer stem cells in the process of metastasis. Other chemokines and their receptors than those discussed in this article may be involved in other types of cancer, and may carry out similar “stemokine” functions.

Since around 90% of cancer deaths are due to metastasis, and since effective treatments for metastatic cancers are few, this is a potentially important area of cancer research and drug development.

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