Almac Discovery, a biopharmaceutical company focused on discovering and identifying therapeutics for the treatment of cancer and Elasmogen, an SME focused on the development of next generation biologics, have been awarded a grant from Innovate UK through its Innovation in Health and Life Sciences funding program.

The £2 million peer reviewed collaborative project entitled, “A Technology Platform for Next Generation VNAR based Oncology Medicines,” plans to utilize the highly selective, high affinity and yet low molecular weight non-antibody VNAR protein scaffold and build a versatile platform to facilitate the discovery and development of targeted oncology therapeutics.

The VNAR structure allows ready access for protein engineering of multiple formats. These VNAR formats can be optimized, with or without conjugation of a cytotoxic payload, with further conversion to soloMER format, to become a first-in-class or best-in-class targeted therapeutic. The two-year project optimizes both target binding and selectivity, via the identification of novel epitopes and formats, approaches to linker design and payload attachments, and further builds upon the experimental data supporting the unique attributes of VNARs.

Almac first entered into an agreement with Elasmogen for the treatment of solid tumors in 2015. This new joint research program broadens the collaborative work by combining Almac Discovery’s expertise in protein engineering and oncology drug discovery with Elasmogen’s expertise in the generation, screening and formatting of VNAR proteins.

“We are delighted to have secured this highly sought after funding from Innovate UK to support this novel field of research which is testament to the novelty of the proposed approach and the quality of the underlying technologies involved,” said Stephen Barr, president and managing director, Almac Discovery. “It is heartening to be able to continue and also broaden our successful collaboration with Elasmogen so that we may remain at the forefront of oncology discovery and ultimately benefit patients.”

Caroline Barelle, chief executive officer, Elasmogen, said, “Given the devastating and wide-ranging impact of cancer on the lives of so many people, there is a continual need to bring new innovative therapies into the clinic. I have no doubt that by combining the oncology expertise of Almac with the advantages of our soloMER platform that we can deliver a new class of drugs to patients.”