INTRODUCING OUR NEW NED

Professor Paul L Herrling, PhD:

“As head of Sandoz Neuroscience Research and Sandoz and Novartis Head of global Research I have followed the Alzheimer drug discovery field for many years and this included the work of Susan Greenfield whom I had met many years ago at a scientific meeting.

Over time her work evolved and generated a body of data that lead to a new hypothesis for the mechanism leading to Alzheimer’s disease involving T14. An interesting aspect of this hypothesis is that it is fully consistent with the body of evidence that had been accumulated on this topic.

The T14 hypothesis points to a mechanism that is preceding APP and tau accumulation in neurons.

When Neuro-Bio had generated a peptide that might interfere with this disease mechanism, Susan asked me if, based on my drug discovery experience, I would advise her as that aspect was not her experience. I agreed to do so and recommended a series of experiments that would determine if the NBP14 peptide could progress in the drug discovery process towards an evaluation in a clinical setting.

The results of these experiments were all consistent and indicated that NBP14 might beneficially interfere with the neurotoxic process that lead to neuronal degeneration in Alzheimer.

Taken together the results obtained in different laboratories around the world are considered sufficient to warrant a further evaluation of NBP14. These experiments included a proof of concept in animal models accepted by the Alzheimer community. Before NBP14 can be evaluated in humans safety studies are necessary and for that a sufficient quantity of GLP grade NBP14 is needed as a next step.

At this point I was asked to join the board of Neuro-Bio as they wished to have a drug discovery expert in their midst. Because of the positive results obtained, and the fact that the T14 approach is sufficiently different from the approaches tested by others previously, I decided to join the Neuro-Bio Board to help in evaluating this new approach that, if successful, would address a major medical need.

The work in drug development terms is still at an early stage and subject to many hurdles until it might be successfully used on patients: however in my view this programme is well worth further pursuing and has the potential of a breakthrough in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease.”