NuMedii and Three Lakes Partners are collaborating to discover and advance new therapies for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). Under the agreement, the companies will use NuMedii’s predictive big data intelligence technology, which enables the discovery of new uses for existing and marketed drugs in inflammation and oncology across a range of therapeutic areas, including rare diseases like IPF.
Big data technology comprises many human, biological, pharmacological and clinical data points that NuMedii has normalized and annotated. The company integrates these data with network-based mathematical algorithms to discover both drug candidates and biomarkers predictive of disease and treatment effectiveness. This strategy is also referred to as artificial intelligence.
“We look forward to working with Three Lakes Partners to identify potential new therapies for IPF, a serious and often fatal lung disease for which there is no effective treatment,” Gini Deshpande, PhD, CEO of NuMedii, said in a press release. “This unique partnership between an AI [artificial intelligence] drug discovery company and a patient-centric organization further builds on our work in inflammation and showcases our progress, particularly our development capabilities in rare disease.”
Three Lakes Partners is a philanthropic organization focused on championing medical and healthcare solutions that might not get the attention they need. The organization provides support for the development of promising technologies for IPF.
Headquartered in Menlo Park, California, NuMedii is a company dedicated to discovering effective new drugs by translating its predictive data intelligence technology into therapies with a higher probability of therapeutic success.
The company is also collaborating with Aptalis and Allergan to discover new therapeutic solutions for patients with ulcerative colitis and psoriasis, respectively.
IPF is a rare, chronic and ultimately fatal disease of unknown cause characterized by a progressive decline in lung function. The condition causes scar tissue (fibrosis) to build up in the lungs, which makes lungs unable to transport oxygen into the bloodstream effectively. The disease usually affects people between the ages of 50 and 70. The most common signs and symptoms are shortness of breath and a persistent cough. While the course of the disease is highly variable, most affected individuals survive three to five years after their diagnosis.
LAVAL, QC, April 18, 2017 /PRNewswire/ – Prometic Life Sciences Inc. (TSX: PLI) (OTCQX: PFSCF) (“Prometic” or the “Corporation”) announced today that it has received concurrence from the US Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) on the design of the first of its PBI-4050’s planned phase 2/3 clinical trials for IPF based on the efficacy data generated in the recently completed 40 patient Phase 2 open-label study.
In that phase 2 study, PBI-4050 was given for 12 weeks to patients who were receiving pirfenidone, nintedanib, or neither agent. The results of the study showed that the Forced Vital Capacity (FVC) remained stable in patients on PBI-4050 alone (n=9, FVC -12 ml) or in patients on PBI-4050 in combination with nintedanib (n=15, FVC +2 ml). In contrast, the results of said study showed that the FVC declined significantly in patients on PBI-4050 in combination with pirfenidone (n=16, FVC -105 ml). PBI-4050’s plasma concentration was sub-therapeutic at 50% of the expected level in patients that received the PBI-4050 and pirfenidone combination, suggesting a drug-drug interaction.