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news.Palatin Technologies, a biopharmaceutical company developing targeted, receptor-specific peptide therapeutics for the treatment of diseases with significant unmet medical need and commercial potential, announced that the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has issued a Notice of Allowance for U.S. Patent Application Serial Number 13/910,422 (the '422 application).
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The application includes composition of matter claims on broad families of melanocortin receptor-1 specific peptides with potential utility for treatment of inflammatory diseases and disorders.
The melanocortin-1 receptor mediates inflammatory responses, and melanocortin-1 receptor agonist peptides have potential application for indications such as inflammatory bowel disease, uveitis, nephritis and rheumatoid arthritis. Palatin has conducted preliminary preclinical studies in both inflammatory bowel disease and uveitis, and is advancing additional confirmatory preclinical studies in these indications prior to initiating human clinical trials.
Palatin is conducting preclinical toxicology and other studies preparatory to filing an Investigational New Drug (IND) application with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and anticipates having one or more pre-IND meetings with the FDA prior to filing an IND this year.
"We believe that our melanocortin-1 receptor peptide agonists, which are both highly selective and specific, represent a new paradigm for treatment of inflammatory diseases and disorders," stated Carl Spana, Ph.D., President and CEO of Palatin. "Securing strong patent protection is a key component of our development program."
The peptides claimed in the ‘422 application are highly specific for the melanocortin-1 receptor, with a number of peptides having sub-nanomolar affinity binding and EC50 functional values. Many of the peptides are also highly selective for the melanocortin-1 receptor, with greater than one thousand times the affinity for the melanocortin-1 receptor than for the melanocortin-4 or melanocortin-3 receptors.
A Notice of Allowance is issued after the USPTO makes a determination that a patent can be granted from an application. When issued, the patent twenty-year term would not expire until November 2030 at the earliest. The Notice of Allowance for the ‘422 application has been posted on the USPTO public PAIR website.