Novogen to develop drugs against genetic and degenerative disorders

Australian biotechnology company Novogen is involved in a pilot programme aimed at developing drugs to treat a range of genetic and non-genetic degenerative diseases including muscular dystrophy, motor neurone disease, Huntington’s Disease, cystic fibrosis and Alzheimer’s Disease.

The firm says a pilot drug has proved to be highly cytotoxic against the initial screen: stem cells from a neuromuscular dystrophy disease.

Novogen is conducting the project in collaboration with another Australian company, Genea Biocells, which has pioneered the isolation and in vitro differentiation of stem cells from embryos with genetic disorders and now holds the world’s largest bank of pluripotent human embryonic stem cells with more than 100 lines covering around 30 different diseases.

The research is based on the discovery that one of the Novogen drug families induces apoptosis in cancer stem cells in a highly potent manner, with the company to date focusing that biological property on the development of anti-cancer drugs.

Novogen CEO, Dr Graham Kelly, said the success of the cancer programme led Novogen scientists to speculate that the same compounds might be equally effective against abnormally-behaving stem cells associated with common degenerative diseases.

'This is an exciting discovery for the company and one that considerably expands its commercial scope. Our immediate focus will always be on the development of anti-cancer drugs, but this discovery cannot be ignored given the life-disrupting seriousness of many genetic and degenerative disorders.

'As a result of this discovery, we now are committing the necessary resources to take this programme to its next phase, which is to design and screen drugs against a wide range of stem cells associated with diseases such as cystic fibrosis, muscular dystrophy, Fragile X, Huntington’s Disease and Alzheimer’s Disease,' he added.

No financial details have been revealed.