Development of hair loss innovative therapy and R & D cooperation reached by Erjian

Recently, exicure announced that it has signed a global cooperation agreement with Allergan The two companies will develop two new treatments for hair loss by using the special 3D spherical nucleic acid (SNA) platform technology Nucleic acid drugs play a therapeutic role by targeting potential pathogenic genes However, reducing toxicity and effective delivery of drugs are the biggest technical problems in the development of nucleic acid drugs Exicure's proprietary SNA technology arranges nucleic acid sequences with potential therapeutic effect intensively on nanoparticles It can not only target a gene, but also achieve double or even triple specificity by arranging different nucleic acid sequences SNA can achieve therapeutic effect through four mechanisms: antisense nucleic acid, siRNA, TLR9 activation, and splice switching Without additional chemical modification, linear nucleic acids are delivered by the system, usually pooled in the liver and quickly cleaned Unlike linear oligonucleotides, SNA enters cells through the ubiquitous scavenger receptors and can be delivered to target tissues in whole or in part, including central nervous system, eyes, skin, gastrointestinal tract, lungs, liver, etc SNA has a high cell uptake ability, which does not need to be encapsulated or compounded in vitro, and has a strong extrahepatic delivery capacity, as well as an extended half-life, which indicates that SNA is more stable in cells ▲ 3D structure of SNA (picture source: Reference: [2]) The main direction of this cooperation is androgenic alopecia, which is one of the most common alopecia diseases In the United States, the disease affects about 50 million men and 30 million women It is estimated that more than $3.5 billion is spent annually on treatment, most of which are ineffective According to the terms of the agreement, Elgin will pay exicure an advance payment of US $25 million At that time, if al China Construction Bank exercises the option, it will be responsible for clinical and market development For each new treatment, exicure will receive R & D and regulatory milestone payments of up to 97.5 million and market milestone payments of up to 265 million Dr David giljohann, CEO of exicure, said: exicure is pleased to combine our knowledge of nucleic acid therapy with iljian's deep expertise in medical aesthetics to jointly develop and promote innovative therapies for hair loss This collaboration is an exciting opportunity to advance exicure's SNA technology in important new therapeutic areas " reference material: [1] Exicure and Allergan Enter Into Collaboration, Option and License Agreement to Discover and Develop SNA-based Treatments for Hair Loss Disorders Retrieved Nov 14, 2019, from http://investors.exicuretx.com/news-releases/news-release-details/exicure-and-allergan-enter-collaboration-option-and-license [2] Exicure is developing nucleic acid therapeutics based on our proprietary Spherical Nucleic Acid (SNA) technology Retrieved Nov 14, 2019, from https://exicuretxcom.ipage.com/assets/PDFs/Exicure_Corporate_Presentation.pdf A kind of