Cellerant Therapeutics Announces Publication Confirming Activity of Myeloid Progenitor Cells in Mouse Model of Chemotherapy-Induced Neutropenia.

PALO ALTO, Calif. -- Cellerant Therapeutics, Inc. today announced the early online publication in the journal Blood of data demonstrating how myeloid progenitor (MP) cells improve survival after opportunistic infections in a murine model of chemotherapy-induced neutropenia. These new data, reported by Janice M.Y. Brown, M.D., Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Divisions of Bone Marrow Transplantation and Infectious Diseases of the Stanford University Medical Center, extend previously published work demonstrating the protective effects of these cells in a murine model of neutropenia following lethal irradiation.

Neutropenia, a condition caused by insufficient numbers of the cells that fight bacterial and fungal infections, is a frequent and potentially life-threatening complication of many cancer treatments. Patients with neutropenia are often hospitalized with fever and infection. Neutropenic episodes may result in physicians lowering the dose of subsequent chemotherapy, which may lower the effectiveness of the cancer treatment. Current therapy for chemotherapy-induced neutropenia includes growth factors, antibiotics, and dose-modification of the chemotherapy regimen.

Myeloid progenitor cells are committed cells in the hematopoietic stem cell ontogeny that can produce red cells, platelets or granulocyte/macrophage lineage cells. Cellerant Therapeutics, the exclusive licensee from Stanford University for the human use of the myeloid progenitor populations, is developing myeloid progenitor cells as a treatment for both radiation- and chemotherapy-induced neutropenia. Cellerant is also pursuing the use of MPs for responding to nuclear terrorism under grants from the federal government.

"Cellerant believes that MPs will fill a critical unmet medical need in the treatment of neutropenia and is committed to bringing this product to the market," said Bruce Cohen, CEO of Cellerant. "We are excited to have confirmation of the efficacy of MPs in a chemotherapy-induced neutropenia setting in addition to Dr. Brown's previous work in radiation-induced neutropenia. We view this as an important step in the evolution of cell therapy away from directed donor-to-patient cell therapy towards manufactured cell products that can be administered like drugs for the treatment and prevention of disease."

In these experiments, mice developed neutropenia after a single dose of the chemotherapeutic agent 5-fluorouracil (5-FU). Animals were then exposed to a lethal challenge of Aspergillus fumigatus, a potentially fatal fungal infection common in patients receiving chemotherapy. Only 33% of control animals survived compared with 54% of animals treated with MP cells (P=0.019). The only anti-fungal therapy the animals received was the MP treatment. Administration of MP cells significantly increased the number of neutrophils in these animals, which are the effector cells that fight fungal and bacterial infections.

"These data confirm that myeloid progenitor cells contribute to a significant increase in survival in mice with chemotherapy-induced neutropenia exposed to a lethal fungal infection. This is important confirmation of the activity of these cells in neutropenia caused by radiation, and validates their potential application in all forms of neutropenia," commented Dr. Brown.

George B. Rathmann, Ph.D., Chairman of the Board of Cellerant and co-founder of Amgen, agreed. "The use of myeloid progenitor cells for the protection of immunosuppressed patients suffering from neutropenia would be a powerful application of specific blood progenitor cells for treating disease when it is translated to human use," Dr. Rathmann stated. "Dr. Brown's work is the first therapeutic application of defined progenitor cell populations."

The manuscript can be found at http://www.bloodjournal.org/cgi/content/abstract/2004-07-2676v1 and will appear in print in a future issue of Blood.

About Cellerant Therapeutics

Cellerant Therapeutics Inc. (www.cellerant.com) is a clinical-stage biotechnology company developing and commercializing the use of hematopoietic (blood-forming) stem cell-based products and therapies for the treatment of autoimmune and blood disorders, infectious disease and cancer. The company's extensive portfolio of intellectual property and clinical assets are licensed from Novartis AG and Stanford University. Cellerant has exclusive rights to the Highly Purified HSC cell population and process, the subject of more than fifteen issued U.S. and foreign patents, and the MP cell population and process, the subject of two issued U.S. patents and several pending U.S. and foreign patent applications.