VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(Marketwired - July 21, 2015) - biOasis (OTCQX:BIOAF)(TSX VENTURE:BTI) and Brigham and Women's Hospital Inc. ("BWH"), Harvard Medical School's distinguished teaching hospital, have entered into a collaboration to pursue work in the area of neuro-oncology.
Dr. Sean Lawler, researcher in the Department of Neurosurgery, Harvard Medical School, will lead the BWH team.
The collaboration intends to initially focus on the advancement to clinic of the Transcend peptide carrier, MTfp, including MTfp-TZM, MTfp-siRNA and MTfp-miRNA within GBM (glioblastoma) models.
BIOASIS TECHNOLOGIES INC. (OTCQX:BIOAF)(TSX VENTURE:BTI), a pioneering biopharmaceutical company focused on overcoming the limitations of therapeutic drug delivery across the blood-brain barrier (BBB), announced today that it is entered into a Research Collaboration Agreement with Brigham and Women's Hospital Inc.
Using biOasis's Transcend Platform peptide carrier, MTfp, biOasis and researchers lead by Dr. Sean Lawler from the Department of Neurosurgery, Harvard Medical School, will work to deliver a number of compounds targeting glioblastoma tumors within the brain. The initial focus of the collaboration will be on the compounds, MTfp-TZM, MTfp-siRNA and MTfp-miRNA. The work will include moving the trastuzumab program forward towards human clinical trials.
A major teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women's Hospital was formed in 1980 with the merger of the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, the Robert Breck Brigham Hospital, and the Boston Hospital for Women, three of Boston's oldest and most prestigious Harvard Medical School teaching hospitals. The BWH website states that, "The BWH Research Institute (BRI) is one of the most powerful biomedical research institutes in the world and the second largest recipient of National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding among independent hospitals in the United States."
Rob Hutchison, biOasis CEO, stated, "biOasis's Transcend Platform and our peptide carrier, MTfp, have shown exceptional promise in the area of neuro-oncology. As we work towards clinical work in humans, establishing relationships like this with world leaders in the field will be critical. BWH represents the ideal partner for biOasis for this collaboration and over the coming months, we will working closely with Sean and his team and lay out the program pathways. This work shall expand our neuro-oncology program that has so far provided us with such confidence in the Transcend platform and our peptide carrier, MTfp."
About BWH: http://brighamandwomens.org/about_bwh/about_us.aspx
About Transcend
Transcend is biOasis' proprietary platform for the delivery of therapeutics across the blood-brain barrier to address unmet medical needs in the treatment of metastatic brain cancers as well as neurodegenerative and metabolic diseases. The delivery of therapeutics across the blood-brain barrier represents the single greatest challenge in treating neurological disorders. The ability to effectively and safely transverse the blood-brain barrier with the Transcend peptide carrier, MTfp, offers the opportunity for biOasis to deliver therapeutics into the brain.
About biOasis
biOasis Technologies Inc. is a biopharmaceutical company headquartered in the Vancouver, Canada area, focused on overcoming the limitations of therapeutic drug delivery across the BBB. The company is developing and commercializing a proprietary brain delivery technology to address unmet medical needs in the treatment of central nervous system disorders. biOasis trades on the OTCQX under the symbol "BIOAF" and on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol "BTI". For more information about the company please visit www.bioasis.ca.
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On Behalf of the Board of Directors
Rob Hutchison, Chairman & CEO
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