Treatment with KIF18A inhibitor led to substantial, dose-dependent inhibition of tumor growth in multiple tumor models, with no effect on normal cells

KIF18A inhibitor on track to enter the clinic in 2H 2023

NEW YORK, September 9, 2022 – Volastra Therapeutics, an oncology company focused on exploiting chromosomal instability (CIN), today announced new data from its lead program, a KIF18A inhibitor, validating its therapeutic approach of synthetic lethality to induce tumor cell death. The data will be presented at the 2022 Consequences of Aneuploidy Conference, organized by the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), which takes place September 11 – 16, 2022, in Southbridge, Mass.

KIF18A is a mitotic kinesin that regulates chromosome alignment during cell division. Leveraging its proprietary CINtech platform, Volastra discovered that CIN-high cancer cells are more dependent on chromosome alignment machinery like KIF18A and are thus more vulnerable to KIF18A inhibition than normal cells.

“Despite the prevalence of chromosomal instability across many tumor types, it has not been fully exploited therapeutically. We are excited to share new preclinical data from our KIF18A inhibitor program showing the ability of this compound to inhibit tumor growth in multiple different models of CIN-high cancer, while leaving normal proliferating cells intact,” said Michael Su, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer at Volastra. “These findings set our KIF18A inhibitor apart from traditional chemotherapies, which can have a detrimental impact on healthy cells. We anticipate initiating a Phase 1 study for this potential best-in-class KIF18A inhibitor in the second half of 2023.”

The FASEB keynote speaker, Professor David Pellman, M.D., of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Volastra Scientific Advisory Board member, states, “The therapeutic potential of targeting chromosomal instability is increasingly compelling. These new data from Volastra’s KIF18A inhibitor further support the promise of developing new and better cancer therapies through a deep understanding of this vulnerability.”

Details of Volastra’s oral data presentation at the Consequences of Aneuploidy Conference are as follows:

Title: “Discovery and Development of KIF18A Inhibitors for the Treatment of Chromosomally Unstable Tumors”

Session: Aneuploidy and Tumor Therapy

Date and Time: Tuesday, September 13, 2022; 2:20 p.m. ET

Presenter: Christina Eng, Ph.D., Vice President, Head of Biology, Volastra Therapeutics 

About Volastra’s CINtech Platform

Volastra’s CINtech platform harnesses a deep biological understanding of chromosomal instability (CIN) as cancer’s most targetable vulnerability to develop promising therapies for patients. CINtech integrates proprietary imaging technologies, model cell line systems and computational analytics to drive a broad and differentiated pipeline. Volastra recently announced a multi-year, up to $1.1 billion, drug discovery collaboration with Bristol Myers Squibb leveraging Volastra’s proprietary CINtech platform to identify CIN-related targets. In addition, Volastra has a partnership with Microsoft to develop AI technologies for the interrogation of CIN.

About Volastra Therapeutics, Inc.

Volastra Therapeutics is a New York-based drug discovery and therapeutics company pioneering novel approaches to treating cancer by exploiting chromosomal instability (CIN), cancer’s most targetable vulnerability. Founded by Lewis Cantley, Ph.D., Olivier Elemento, Ph.D., and Samuel Bakhoum, M.D., Ph.D., Volastra is rapidly developing and implementing new methods to exploit this vulnerability.   Leveraging its proprietary CINtech platform, the company is advancing a novel synthetic lethal and immune activating pipeline. Volastra’s lead program targets KIF18A, a mitotic kinesin, with a first-in-human study anticipated to start in 2023.

For more information, please visit volastratx.com.

 

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