On May 5, 2020 Exicure, Inc. (NASDAQ: XCUR), the pioneer in gene regulatory and immunotherapeutic drugs utilizing spherical nucleic acid (SNA) constructs, reported that it will present at the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR) (Free AACR Whitepaper) Virtual Annual Meeting II, occurring June 22 – 24, 2020 (Press release, Exicure, MAY 5, 2020, View Source [SID1234557039]).
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The AACR (Free AACR Whitepaper) poster titled "Phase 1b/2 Study of an Intratumoral TLR9 Agonist Spherical Nucleic Acid (AST-008) and Pembrolizumab: Evidence of Immune Activation" will present updated pharmacodynamic and safety data of AST-008 alone and in combination with pembrolizumab from Exicure’s ongoing Phase 1b/2 study (ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT03684785).
This poster will be presented during the AACR (Free AACR Whitepaper) Virtual Meeting II in the session Late-Breaking Research: Clinical Research 1 / Endocrinology under abstract number LB-140. The abstract will be available for viewing on May 15th and the poster will be available for viewing on June 22nd.
About AST-008
AST-008 is an SNA consisting of toll-like receptor 9 agonists designed for immuno-oncology applications. As of January 31, 2020, we have dosed 17 patients in the Phase 1b stage of the clinical trial. We have observed no treatment related serious adverse events, nor have we observed any dose-limiting toxicity among the treated subjects. The most common reported adverse event was injection site reactions. In December 2019, we received preliminary results from the Phase 1b/2 stage of the clinical trial showing potential signs of anti-tumor activity in patients with Merkel cell carcinoma. In the second quarter of 2020, we plan to initiate a Phase 2 dose expansion for intratumoral AST-008 in combination with approved checkpoint inhibitors to treat two cohorts of patients with advanced or metastatic Merkel cell carcinoma or cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma. Each cohort is expected to enroll up to 29 patients who have failed anti-PD-1/PD-L1, or programmed cell death protein 1/programmed death-ligand 1, therapy. We expect to open a total of up to 15 sites in the United States.