Wednesday 25 Jun 2014 @ 09:15
Technology Strategy Board
Technology Strategy Board
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Success story - CellCentric - Combating deadly prostate cancers
Most men will have some form of prostate cancer
inside them when they die, and the disease claims over 100,000 victims around
the world each year.
"There are many different forms of prostate
cancer, the most common male cancer. In 20% of cases it's very aggressive
and you could be dead in nine months," said Will West, chief executive
of CellCentric.
The company, based in Cambridge, is pioneering a
revolutionary solution using the relatively new science of epigenetics, the
study of the mechanisms additional to gene sequences that decide how a
cell's fate is determined. The Technology Strategy Board - the UK's
innovation agency - is playing a major role in helping CellCentric take its
idea from concept to clinical trial.
In
June 2013, CellCentric won a major award of over £2m from the Technology
Strategy Board's Biomedical Catalyst. This
scheme, run in partnership with the Medical Research Council, supports the
development of innovative medical therapies and technologies in academia and
small and medium-sized enterprises.
Working with academic collaborators, CellCentric has
identified enzymes, including a deubiquitinase (known as DUB), that regulates
cellular processes involved in the development of a highly aggressive form of
prostate cancer. The company aims to identify and optimise inhibitors to such
enzymes as the basis for new drugs.
"If, through epigenetics, we can identify
cancer-promoting mechanisms inside a cell and how these are being triggered, we
can create small molecule inhibitors to counter them, which could have a
profound effect," said Will.
Bridging the funding gap
Many innovative technologies and products fail to bridge
the funding and resource gap (colloquially known as the ‘valley of
death') between basic biomedical research and clinical
development.
