Lipoxen and Nottingham to develop ‘direct of liver’ hepatitis C treatment

Collaboration formed

The East Midland’s bioKneX Industrial Partnership Scheme is funding a project led by Lipoxen, a company spun out from the School of Pharmacy at the University of London, and the University of Nottingham. Both institutions are invested in the development of vaccine delivery systems, and have entered a research agreement to develop liposome and nanoparticle-based hepatitis C (HPC) vaccines that can be applied directly to the liver and limit anti-viral drug uptake by other tissues.

The collaboration between Lipoxen and Nottingham University will aim to develop a drug delivery system using nanoparticles that can localise higher doses of anti-viral treatment against HPC specifically to the liver sparing other tissues, so improving treatment effectiveness and reducing morbidity induced by conventional anti-HPC vaccines which can be highly toxic to the whole body.

The project seeks to design a “super generic” formulation of common viral hepatitis drug ribavirin used in combination with pegylated-interferon and delivered using liposomes or nanoparticles. The collaboration will also investigate how to improve other anti-viral drugs that have been unsuccessful in treating HPC.

Scott Maguire, of Lipoxen, said: “We are very excited to be working with the University of Nottingham on this project as we believe that by combining our expertise in liposomal and nanoparticle drug formulation with their tissue engineering and molecular virology expertise, we can develop a new ‘direct to liver’ delivery solution to improve the effectiveness of hepatitis C drugs.”

Will Irving, from the University of Nottingham, said: "We are delighted to be involved in this exciting project. If we can succeed in delivering increased doses of ribavirin to the infected liver through our novel delivery systems, it is highly likely we will improve treatment response rates, which are currently limited mostly by the amount of ribavirin an individual patient can tolerate. In addition, such a 'proof of principle' would open up other opportunities for the use of powerful antiviral drugs that are also limited by their systemic toxicities.”