Unravel Biosciences Partners with Spanios to Discover Therapeutic Targets for Rare Cancer

Partnership unlocks synergistic capabilities to accelerate rare cancer therapies

BOSTON, Nov. 8, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Unravel Biosciences, Inc. ("Unravel"), a therapeutics company that leverages a machine-learned model of human health to advance drugs for complex diseases, today announced a partnership with Spanios ("Spanios"), a precision oncology company facilitating effective treatments for patients with rare and other solid cancers. The partnership combines Unravel's proprietary gene regulatory network and drug-gene interaction network model of human health and drug response with Spanios's patient-derived tumoroids (PDTs) to discover novel therapeutic targets for rare cancers. Starting with an undisclosed rare cancer indication, the partnership will pursue novel target and biomarker discovery, setting the stage for future indication expansion to other rare and non-rare oncology indications.

Rare cancers together affect more than 400,000 patients per year in the US and more commonly outside of the US. The rare indications generally have a poor prognosis and high recurrence rate with limited treatment options.

Unravel will apply its AI gene network-based computational model to predict therapeutic compounds and underlying new targets based on transcriptomic information. Spanios will apply its proprietary PDT platform and access to rare tumor patient samples to screen the compounds in models that better recapitulate the original tumor microenvironment. Both companies will use the hits to discover novel targets and mechanisms of action, further iterating on the synergistic computational-wet-lab screening approach.

"At Spanios, we are committed to rapidly enabling drug development in rare cancers by removing traditional rate limiters in the wet-lab," said Vivek Ravi, Spanios CEO. "We are excited to enter into this partnership: Unravel's unique perspective on computational drug discovery combined with Spanios's ability to rapidly validate drug interactions in the wet-lab paves way for discovery of effective drug targets for several rare indications. This collaboration serves as further proof of the important role that early wet-lab validation of computational platforms will play in accelerating the discovery of new therapies for conditions that may have previously gone unaddressed."

"We are excited to partner with Spanios to discover effective drug targets for rare cancer patients," said Richard Novak, PhD, Unravel Cofounder and CEO. "Spanios high-fidelity PDT platform will expand Unravel's target discovery platform into oncology while building an innovative and versatile partnership framework to tackle additional orphan diseases."

Unravel Biosciences is a personalized therapeutics company that redefines diseases through RNA network analysis to seamlessly bridge target discovery with clinical efficacy of new drugs. Unravel leverages its proprietary BioNAV™ platform combining target and drug discovery, preclinical screening and patient stratification to find treatments for complex diseases impacting the whole body. Unravel's platform discovered RVL001, a proprietary formulation targeting Rett Syndrome that will enter the clinic in late 2022, and RVL002, a new small molecule with applications in CNS and metabolic diseases. www.unravel.bio.

Spanios's proprietary patient-derived 3D tumoroid (PDT) platform brings patient diversity and biological complexity of solid tumors into the earliest stages of drug discovery. The unique platform overcomes limitations of traditional approaches such as xenografts and animal models by creating a resilient replica of host tumor environments. These models encompass both the tumor and its microenvironment growing together in unison to develop tumoroids that respond to treatments in a manner similar to the patient. This keeps the focus on identifying new pathways, bringing optimal treatments to the clinic, by enabling scientists to fast-track their search for novel cures to bring hope to millions of patients.

SOURCE Unravel Biosciences, Inc.