Infinity Offers Hint Of Effect With Pancreatic Cancer Drug
Summary
The Cambridge, MA-based biotech company (NASDAQ: INFI) is announcing results today from a small study of 16 patients that suggest its experimental once-a-day pill, saridegib (IPI-926), may be able to shrink tumors and help people live longer when given in combination with chemotherapy.There was no way to compare how good this performance was since there was no control group in the trial, but historical studies have shown patients with this diagnosis can expect to live about six months.“We’re definitely in the game,” said Julian Adams, Infinity’s president of R&D, in an interview last week at the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco.That’s because the compound is designed to inhibit a biological target known as Smoothened, a component of the Hedgehog pathway that is thought to help tumors grow and thrive when it’s turned into a mutated form.Infinity scientists showed, in a paper published in Science in 2009, that the drug disrupted the dense tissue matrix that encases tumors, Adams says.