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ApoImmune, Inc. Awarded NIH Phase I SBIR Grant for Treatment of Type 1 Diabetes
August 1, 2007 (Louisville, KY) - ApoImmune, Inc. today announced that it has been awarded a one-year Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant of $422,000 from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to develop a novel treatment for Type 1 Diabetes. The grant was awarded by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), and will fund preclinical work to develop the Company's ApoFasL transplantation technology. This award is the sixth NIH SBIR/STTR grant received by the company.
ApoFasL is an immunotherapy treatment that improves current organ and tissue transplant therapies by regulating the immune system of the recipient. ApoFasL is applied to the organ/tissue/cell to be transplanted and protects it from being attacked when transplanted into the recipient. An added benefit of ApoFasL is that it reduces the need for powerful immunosuppressive drugs with highly toxic effects that are required after transplantation.
Of particular interest to ApoImmune is the use of the technology to induce transplant tolerance in Type 1 Diabetes. ApoImmune researchers are working to develop a novel insulin-replacement therapy using ApoFasL that will allow successful pancreatic islet transplantation without long-term use of immunosuppressive drugs, thus eliminating harmful side effects that accompany their long-term use. Induction of tolerance without the chronic use of immunosuppressive drugs will be an important therapeutic advancement required for the efficient treatment of Type 1 Diabetes in the clinic.
About Type 1 Diabetes and islet transplantation
Type 1 Diabetes is an autoimmune disease that results in the permanent destruction of insulin-producing beta cells of the pancreas. Insulin is a necessary hormone that regulates carbohydrate metabolism, most notably glucose metabolism. Type 1 Diabetes is lethal unless treatment with exogenous insulin, via injections or a pump, replaces the missing hormone. This relieves the uncontrolled glucose levels in the disease but does not restore normal pancreatic function. Transplanting pancreatic beta cells, or more specifically the pancreatic islets which contain the beta cells, provides a more physiological therapy for controlling glucose levels. In islet transplantation, islets are taken from a donor pancreas and transferred into another person. Once implanted, the beta cells in these islets begin to make and release insulin. This approach would allow some people currently treated with insulin to live without the daily injections.
About ApoImmune, Inc.
ApoImmune Inc. is a Louisville, Kentucky-based biotechnology company developing novel immunotherapies, which are treatments based on the concept of regulating the immune system to fight disease. The Company's lead immunotherapy is based on the ProtEx technology's ability to teach the immune system to recognize foreign pathogens as harmful and specifically target those harmful cells for destruction. ApoImmune is also developing ProtEx to suppress the immune system in certain cases, which improves current organ and tissue transplant therapies by protecting the transplant from being attacked by the recipient's immune system when transplanted into the body. An added benefit of the ProtEx immune system suppression technology is that it also reduces the need for powerful immunosuppressive drugs with highly toxic effects that are required after transplantation.
For more information, visit www.apoimmune.com.
Certain statements made throughout this press release that are not historical facts contain forward-looking statements regarding the Company's future plans, objectives and expected performance. Any such forward-looking statements are based on assumptions that the Company believes are reasonable, but are subject to a wide range of risks and uncertainties and, therefore, there can be no assurance that actual results may not differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements.
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