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Artizan Biosciences Selects Lead Product Candidate for Inflammatory Bowel Disease Therapeutic Development ProgramNEW HAVEN, Conn., Jan. 18, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Artizan Biosciences, Inc. (“Artizan”), a precision medicine biotechnology company, today announced the selection of its lead product candidate, ARZC-001, for the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (“IBD”). Discovered internally and wholly owned by Artizan, ARZC-001 is a novel, oral, gut-restricted potent small molecule inhibitor that is designed to neutralize a specific secreted factor of microbial-driven dysregulation and inflammation in the intestine. In patients susceptible to IBD, certain organisms (or “pathobionts”) induce disruption of the gastrointestinal epithelial barrier causing chronic inflammatory disorders, including gastrointestinal diseases. Artizan’s highly differentiated IgA-SEQ™ technology and its flagship IBD-BIOME biobanking program allow the company to identify the patients where these culprits lurk and identify the factors they secrete. Artizan then develops small molecule and biologic therapeutics that inhibit these targets that act as agents in the inflammatory cascade. “While progress has been made in IBD therapies, approximately 30% of patients are unresponsive to initial biologics therapy and, even among responsive patients, up to 10% stop responding to treatment annually,” said Bridget Martell, M.A., M.D., Artizan’s President and CEO. “Given the significant unmet medical need for sustained clinical remission in these patients on lifelong therapy, we are excited to advance ARZC-001 into the clinic to help patients with these devastating diseases and look forward to filing an Investigational New Drug application by the end of 2022.” ARZC-001 is the first in a robust pipeline of product candidates in Artizan’s portfolio. Each candidate is distinctly different in its chemical composition and the target that it is aiming to inhibit. As it continues preclinical research, Artizan anticipates that ARZ-003 and ARZ-005 will enter the clinic shortly behind ARZC-001. “This significant milestone represents the ability of the Artizan team to leverage the microbiome as a drug discovery tool in order to identify and characterize specific drivers of dysbiosis and immunologic dysregulation that drive chronic inflammatory processes,” said Noah W. Palm, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Immunobiology, a member of the Human and Trnslational Immunology Program both at Yale University, and a scientific co-founder of the company. “I look forward to seeing the progress of ARZC-001 in the clinic and demonstrating the potential of Artizan’s unique technology to develop therapeutics in IBD and other disease areas.” Artizan’s proprietary drug discovery platform is applicable to a broad range of therapeutic areas, including central nervous system conditions, certain cancers, metabolic disorders, and autoimmune diseases. Recently, the Company also announced a Parkinson’s disease therapeutic discovery and development program collaboration with Biohaven Therapeutics Ltd. About Inflammatory Bowel Disease About Artizan Biosciences, Inc. Artizan Biosciences Media Contact: 1 Hazel K, O’Connor A. Emerging treatments for inflammatory bowel disease. Ther Adv Chronic Dis. 2020;11:2040622319899297. Published 2020 Feb 5. DOI: 10.1177/2040622319899297 2 GBD 2017 Inflammatory Bowel Disease Collaborators. The global, regional, and national burden of inflammatory bowel disease in 195 countries and territories, 1990-2017: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017. Lancet Gastroenterol Hepatol. 2020 Jan;5(1):17-30. doi: 10.1016/S2468-1253(19)30333-4. Epub 2019 Oct 21. PMID: 31648971; PMCID: PMC7026709. 3 Dahlhamer JM, Zammitti EP, Ward BW, Wheaton AG, Croft JB. Prevalence of Inflammatory Bowel Disease Among Adults Aged =18 Years — United States, 2015. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2016;65:1166–1169. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm6542a3external icon |