Notebook • Volume XXVI • 2018
Fighting Superbugs with Super Drugs Curza, a privately-held small-molecule
Chemistry in 2002, will serve as principal
drug development company, has been
investigator. Funding will be used to
an exciting addition to the CARB-X
awarded a grant of up to $4 million from
optimize the lead series using structural
portfolio as it has been decades since
CARB-X, a global non-profit partnership
biology and rigorous biological and
the last new class was approved for
dedicated to accelerating the develop-
biochemical characterization to ensure
Gram-negative bacteria. The world
ment of antibiotics, vaccines, diagnostics
safety in humans. The project will
urgently needs new antibiotics, rapid
and other products to combat the rising
advance Curza’s first-in-class antibiotics
diagnostics, vaccines and entirely new
threat of drug-resistant bacteria.
through pre-clinical development
approaches to protect us from drug
culminating in IND preparation to
resistant bacteria,” said Kevin Outterson,
initiate a Phase I clinical trial.
Executive Director of CARB-X.
Curza’s technology originates from the University laboratories of Ryan
“Curza’s new class of antibiotics is
Looper, in the Department of Chemistry, and Dustin Williams in Medicine. Under the funding agreement, Curza will receive an initial award of up to $2.2 million, with the possibility of $1.8 million more from CARB-X based on the achievement of certain project milestones. Ryan Davies, CEO of Curza, said, “We are honored to receive this prestigious CARB-X award to help advance our novel antibiotic program. It not only recognizes the potential of our Gram-negative antibiotic program, but it will help fund its development through pre-clinical research stages.” Curza’s lead program is designed
With original technology
to kill bacteria with known resistance to other ribosomal antibiotics by binding
licensed from the University of According to the World Health
to a clinically un-drugged and highly
Organization (WHO), an estimated
conserved site on the bacterial ribosome.
700,000 people die each year around
These new antibiotics’ unique mechanism
the world from bacterial infections.
of action allows maximum penetration of
In the U.S. alone, an estimated 23,000
bacterial cells leading to potent activity
people die each year from drug-resistant
against drug-resistant pathogens.
bacterial infections, according to the
Dr. Chad Testa, who earned a doctorate degree in the Department of
Utah, Curza is in the early stages of developing two novel classes of antibiotics.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
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