Potential Breakthrough Therapy for Cancer Based on Pepscan's CLIPS Technology

LELYSTAD, Netherlands, July 6, 2017 /PRNewswire/ --

Pepscan, the Dutch biotech company specialized in protein mimicry for the discovery of therapeutics peptides, announced today important progress with a drug development program based on its proprietary CLIPS technology. 

A team of Bicycle Therapeutics in the UK applied Pepscan's CLIPS technology to identify a bicyclic CLIPS peptide that selectively binds to a protein (MT1-MMP) present on tumor cells. They subsequently linked a toxin payload to the high affinity bicyclic peptide, to create a 'Bicycle Drug Conjugate (BDC)'. The compound, codenamed BT1718, appears to penetrate tumors rapidly. Because of its peptidic nature, BT1718 can be rapidly cleared through the kidney, which minimizes toxicity relating to payload mediated gastrointestinal and liver toxicity. Bicycle Therapeutics reported superior efficacy of BT1718 to standard of care controls in multiple preclinical patient and cell-derived mouse xenograft models.

In the course of 2017, BT1718 will advance to the first stage of clinical testing in human patients; Cancer Research UK, the largest cancer charitable organization in the UK, will sponsor and fund the upcoming Phase 1 study.

Wim Mol, CEO of Pepscan commented: "We are very pleased with the great progress made by Bicycle Therapeutics with their CLIPS based lead program aimed at a new therapy for the treatment of cancer. It confirms the potential of bicyclic '2-CLIPS' peptides as a new generation of biotherapeutics, offering antibody-like affinity and selectivity in a small, fully synthetic molecule. Pepscan is open to work with other companies interested in applying the CLIPS technology for the discovery of novel bicyclic 2-CLIPS peptides for therapeutic or diagnostic applications".

About Pepscan 

Pepscan is a privately held company based in Lelystad, The Netherlands. Pepscan is a premier provider of peptide based products and services, and also offers its profound knowledge of peptides for drug discovery collaborations. Pepscan is specialized in constrained peptides, and is the inventor of the CLIPS constraining technology. The bicyclic '2-CLIPS' peptides represent a new generation of biotherapeutics, offering antibody-like affinity and selectivity in a small, fully synthetic molecule.

About CLIPS technology 

CLIPS (Chemical LInkage of Peptides onto Scaffolds) is a technology to present one or more peptides in a structurally constrained configuration. These molecules behave as functional mimics of complex protein domains. CLIPS peptides have been used in antibody and vaccine programs to create superior immunogens in the generation of antibodies against disease relevant protein targets. This is especially valuable in the case of proteins that are inaccessible as recombinant proteins, such as GPCRs and ion-channels. CLIPS technology was invented by Pepscan, which holds various patents and patent applications worldwide.

Source: Website Bicycle Therapeutics, accessed June 26, 2017. 

http://www.pepscan.com

SOURCE Pepscan