A few days ago, the Austrian biotechnology company apeiron biology announced the launch of an investigator initiated clinical trial (i.e., a clinical study initiated by researchers or academic institutions) of apn01 for the treatment of severe covid-19 infection in China. The clinical study was supported by anku Biotechnology (Suzhou) Co., Ltd. and cooperated with clinical cro dimai biology.
Professor Josef penninger, the co-founder of apeiron biology, and Dr. Zhang Liqun, the vice president, were hired as the project manager of Jiangsu Institute of industrial technology in December 2017, and landed in Suzhou high tech Zone in April 2019 in the form of major projects of Jiangsu Institute of industrial technology. The project company is anku Biotechnology (Suzhou) Co., Ltd., which is committed to establishing a new biological drug screening and development platform based on haploid stem cell technology
It is reported that this clinical study plans to enroll 24 patients with severe covid-19 covid-19 infection in order to obtain the safety and effectiveness of recombinant ACE2 protein in the treatment of covid-19. This clinical study will be treated for 7 days, and the preliminary data will be used to evaluate and declare for a larger phase 2B clinical study.
Professor Josef penninger
As a world-renowned medical scientist, he has made many breakthrough research achievements and developed new drugs that can benefit millions of patients. His scientific research achievements have opened up many new research fields: his research on ACE2 links cardiovascular biology with malnutrition; He has made key contributions to cancer immunotherapy; His recently published article described that a new group of RNA can cause motor neuron loss, leading to progressive paralysis and microcephaly in mice with genetic variation and children with clp1 variation; In addition, his recently published article provides the first description of the heart attack of newborn mice and the regeneration of the complete heart of human infants, the first model of complete heart repair, and provides key research results and experimental systems for repairing human "broken heart" in the future
Professor Josef penninger is both the co-founder of apeiron and one of the inventors of apn01. In 2005, Professor Josef penninger worked with experts from Peking Union Medical College to confirm that ACE2 is the receptor of SARS, and the relevant results were published in nature. Apn01 is a recombinant human ACE2 protein. Previous clinical studies have been used to treat acute lung injury, pulmonary hypertension and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS, one of the main causes of death of covid-19). It is in the stage of phase II clinical research.
Professor Josef penninger said, "the cooperation between our laboratory and the professor of Peking Union Medical College Hospital provided the first in vivo evidence that ACE2 is a sars-cov-2 receptor in mice, and confirmed that ACE2 has a potential lung protective effect. I am very excited that based on our research, we found that ACE2 has a potential role in the treatment of covid-19 infection, and can enter the clinic for verification".
