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CritiTech Inc. awarded NIH grant for new cancer drug. August 04, 2004 LAWRENCE, Kan. - CritiTech announced today that it had received a $100,000.00 National Cancer Institute STTR grant from the National Institutes of Health in support of its intraperitoneal nanoparticulate paclitaxel drug, Nanotax®, which is used to treat ovarian cancer. The company, in cooperation with the University of Kansas Medical Center has performed preclinical ovarian cancer studies at KUMC under the direction of Katherine Roby, a research associate professor in the Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology and a member of The Kansas Masonic Cancer Research Institute and the Center for Reproductive Sciences at KUMC. "The NIH grant to CritiTech demonstrates perfectly how universities, entrepreneurs and the federal government are joining together to make sure that drugs with life-saving potential get to the marketplace," said University of Kansas Chancellor Robert Hemenway. "KU is very proud to be associated with CritiTech and with principled entrepreneurs like Sam Campbell." CritiTech's nanoparticles of paclitaxel are produced by a patented supercritical fluid process that was originally invented by a group of researchers led by Bala Subramaniam in the Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering at the KU School of Engineering and then applied to the area of pharmaceutical drug delivery and drug development at the KU Higuchi Biosciences Center. The collaborative efforts by Subramaniam and fellow KU faculty members Roger Rajewski, Valentino Stella, John Haslam, Fenghui Niu and Charles Decedue to develop applications of this technology for the pharmaceutical industry have resulted in numerous breakthroughs in small particle pharmaceutical formation, collection and coating. "The results of these early studies are very encouraging and the research will move forward aggressively as a result of this grant," said CritiTech CEO and president Sam Campbell. The NIH-funded study will assess the effects of nanoparticulate paclitaxel, Nanotax®, on the progression of ovarian cancer. Preliminary data indicates that intraperitoneal (IP) delivery of a simple suspension of Nanotax® in phosphate buffered saline substantially prolonged the survival times of mice implanted with ovarian cancer cells compared to conventional vehicle and Taxol® controls. The current study will further compare the effect of IP Nanotax® vs Taxol® delivery in mice that have been surgically debulked to more closely resemble the human clinical treatment modality. In addition, the study will include an examination of the tissue distribution of IP Nanotax® and IP Taxol®. In particular, ascites fluid, blood, peritoneal immune cells and peritoneal tumor cells will be assayed for paclitaxel levels over time. It is hoped that the knowledge gained from these studies will allow a better understanding of the mechanism of increased survival times through IP nanoparticulate drug delivery. This study will assess the potential of Nanotax® delivered intraperitoneally as a means to improve on the current treatment for women with ovarian cancer. CritiTech provides critical drug delivery and development technology for the pharmaceutical industry. CritiTech produces fine-particle pharmaceuticals including nanoparticle pharmaceuticals using patented technologies developed at KU. The processes use compressed carbon dioxide as the processing medium to produce relatively residue-free and uniform drug microparticles and coatings. The pharmaceutical industry has exhibited substantial interest in processes that produce improved formulations using nanoparticulate drugs in order to extend the patent life of an existing drug or to enable the delivery of a poorly soluble compound. CritiTech has also successfully used its proprietary technology to coat medicinal agents either on small particle drugs for improved drug delivery or as a thin film on implantable medical devices such as cardiac stents. The Nanotax® ovarian cancer drug is the first drug to be announced under the company's drug development program. For further information please contact: |
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