About PNP Therapeutics
Overview
PNP Therapeutics®, Inc. is a clinical-stage, biopharmaceutical company engaged in the development of a platform technology and proprietary products for the treatment of cancer. At the center of PNP's Therapeutic System is a patented enzyme (E. coli purine nucleoside phosphorylase) that has been shown to work with a variety of well-characterized nucleoside prodrugs generating active metabolites with high levels of anti-tumor activity. PNP Therapeutics® is the exclusive licensee of a comprehensive collection of patents that broadly and specifically cover the Company's technology. These patents are owned jointly by the University of Alabama at Birmingham Research Foundation and Southern Research Institute of Birmingham, Alabama.
Basic Premise
Many common cancers (including prostate, breast, colon, lung, brain, melanoma, pancreas, ovarian, kidney) become untreatable despite the best medical intervention and the highest standard of care and are eventually fatal. There are compounds that could abolish these tumors, but these are typically much too toxic to administer systemically to an already debilitated cancer patient. PNP's therapeutic strategy is based on the notion that solid tumors can be programmed to generate their own chemotherapy and thus elicit their own self-destruction. This selectivity is achieved by producing the PNP enzyme directly within the tumor cells and facilitating the interaction between the enzyme and a circulating prodrug in a relatively enclosed environment; the tumor mass itself. We have shown that this mode of chemotherapeutic action is remarkably potent, abolishes otherwise refractory human cancers, and can be used safely because it is executed and confined within the tumor mass.