Race Oncology (ASX:RAC) has shared the results from recent preclinical work performed under contract at Oncolines in the Netherlands, combining bisantrene with decitabine.
The company said in the studies that the combination was screened for enhanced anti-cancer activity across a panel of 143 cancer cell lines, representing solid and blood cancers originating from more than 20 different human tissues.
Decitabine is a nucleoside analogue drug used to treat some blood cancers, such as myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML). However, it has not shown clinical efficacy in solid tumours.
In this study, decitabine enhanced the cell-killing activity of bisantrene across a comprehensive range of the most common human cancer types, including many solid tumours.
Race said combining decitabine with bisantrene at clinically relevant concentrations significantly enhanced cancer cell-killing, with 92 per cent (131 out of 143) of the cell lines showing improvement.
"These new results suggest the clinical utility of decitabine could be expanded beyond blood cancers to solid tumours if used with bisantrene," it said.
Race CEO Dr Daniel Tillett said, “These results open exciting new treatment opportunities for both bisantrene and decitabine. While decitabine has proven its effectiveness in haematological cancers, it has not demonstrated clinical utility in solid tumours, like lung or breast cancer. This new body of work is highly supportive of the results from the University of Newcastle in preclinical AML models using a combination of bisantrene and decitabine. Thanks to the continued support of our shareholders, we are looking forward to announcing a clinical trial of this promising anticancer drug combination in the near future.”