The study was designed to evaluate the protective effect of MU1140 when administered by intravenous injection to mice infected intraperitoneally with a lethal dose of Staphylococcus aureus.
The antibiotic has shown significant activity in the laboratory against a number of clinically relevant bacterial isolates. The results of the mouse sepsis study suggest that MU1140 also acts against bacteria in a living animal.
The company said that it plans to complete by the end of this year the preclinical tests necessary to begin a phase I clinical trial.
“It's important to note that MU1140 operates via a novel mechanism of action. Because of this, we expect that bacteria will have difficulty in developing resistance to it. However, we still need to perform additional preclinical studies before deciding if MU1140 can serve as a useful drug against bacterial infections,” said Dr Jeffrey Hillman, Oragenics' chief scientific officer.
Dr Robert Zahradnik, CEO of Oragenics, added that “the medical community has been urging companies to invest in the anti-infectives area because bacterial infections are becoming more difficult to treat, with resistant strains on the increase.”