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Tapestry Pharmaceuticals has highlighted findings of preclinical studies evaluating its third generation taxane, NBT- 287, in human tumour cell lines.

The results, published in the Proceedings of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) in New Orleans, suggest that NBT-287 may have potential in treating both paclitaxel-resistant and treatment naive cancers.

Specifically, the study demonstrates that NBT-287 is significantly more potent than paclitaxel in taxane resistant cell lines, and equivalent to or better than paclitaxel in cells that have not developed resistance to taxanes. Taxanes are the most widely prescribed chemotherapeutics and are used in a variety of cancers such as breast, lung, and ovarian.

'These data suggest a broad therapeutic potential for NBT-287, particularly since current taxane therapies often lead to drug resistance. Since NBT-287 is designed to circumvent MDR-1, a protein associated with resistance to taxane-based therapies, it may represent an alternative treatment option for these patients,' stated Leonard Shaykin, chairman and ceo of Tapestry Pharmaceuticals. 'The cytotoxic properties of NBT-287 in nonresistant cell lines are also promising, and support our continued development in animal models.'

Tapestry researchers compared the activity of NBT-287 with paclitaxel in human tumour cell lines exhibiting various expression levels of MDR-1. NBT-287 was up to 200 times more potent than paclitaxel in MDR-1 positive cell lines and an ovarian mutant tubulin MDR-1 negative tumor cell line. The compound was equivalent to or better than paclitaxel in other MDR-1 negative cell lines.

'The data emerging from this program is very encouraging and we look forward to advancing this program into clinical trials,' commented Shaykin.