Cancer is the second leading cause of death worldwide, accounting for nearly 10 million deaths in 2022. First-line treatment usually consists of chemotherapy regimens containing anthracyclines, with Doxorubicin being among the most used. However, Doxorubicin has been shown to induce numerous side effects.
Researchers from the Universidad Católica San Antonio de Murcia (UCAM), University of Lodz and Silesian University of Technology have jointly tested the synergetic effect of Glimepiride and Doxorubicin combined, achieving positive results and offering the potential of drug repurposing to be used as an effective cancer treatment. They have identified a combination of Glimepiride and Doxorubicin as an effective treatment for cancer. After numerous tests, at first with drugs individually, and then combined with different concentrations, results showed additive or synergistic effects of significantly reducing the hyperproliferative activity of human cancer cells.
The development team has already tested the benefits of the proposed combination in in vitro models of human cell lines: breast tumor tissue, lung adenocarcinoma tissue and glioma tissue, with promising results.
Benefits:
- Combination of Doxorubicin and Glimepiride has a beneficial effect on increasing anti-cancer activity by reducing the cancer cell survival.
- Reduce concentration of Doxorubicin leads to reduction in treatment time, side effects and toxicity associated with treatment.
- The two repurposed candidates are generic drugs, which could provide a faster and more cost-effective route to development. Drug repurposing facilitates clinical trials and significantly reduces their cost.
The represented institution is looking for a collaboration that leads to commercial exploitation of the presented invention.
Institution: Universidad Católica San Antonio de Murcia (UCAM), University of Lodz and Silesian University of Technology
TRL: 3-4
Protection status: Patent Application
Contact: Noelia Mas / noelia@viromii.com
