By John Duchemin
Advertiser Staff Writer
‘Aiea research company Hawaii Biotechnology Group Inc. has won a $275,000 grant from the National Cancer Institute to develop a drug that would deliver small amounts of lethal substances to cancer cells while leaving healthy cells unharmed.
The one-year award will let Hawaii Biotech begin to test the drug, a chemically engineered variation of tumor-fighting chemotherapy agent 9AC.
That drug has proven effective in killing tumor cells in animal trials, but is highly toxic and thus has not succeeded in human trials, Hawaii Biotech officials said. Company scientists believe their variation would be harmless as it travels through the body - but would trigger lethal elements upon encountering cancer cells, which have unique molecular signatures.
"This grant will let us test our belief," said Sean O’Malley, managing scientist of Hawaii Biotech’s chemistry group. If successful, Hawaii Biotech will conduct pre-clinical trials on lab animals; success there would be followed by human trials, O’Malley said.
Hawaii Biotech has applied for patents for the process and the compound, known as a "targeted prodrug," company President David Watumull said.
Hawaii Biotech, a 20-employee company founded in 1982, has generated more than $28 million in research grants, most for human therapeutic projects.
