Tasquinimod (ABR-215050, CID 54682876) is an experimental drug currently being investigated for the treatment of solid tumors. Tasquinimod has been mostly studied in

prostate cancer Prostate cancer is the neoplasm, uncontrolled growth of cells in the prostate, a gland in the male reproductive system below the bladder. Abnormal growth of the prostate tissue is usually detected through Screening (medicine), screening tests, ...

, but its mechanism of action suggests that it could be used to treat other cancers. Castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), formerly called hormone-resistant or hormone-refractory prostate cancer, is prostate cancer that grows despite medical or surgical androgen deprivation therapy. Tasquinimod targets the tumor microenvironment and counteracts cancer development by inhibiting angiogenesis and metastasis and by modulating the immune system. It is now in phase III

development Development or developing may refer to: Arts *Development (music), the process by which thematic material is reshaped * Photographic development *Filmmaking, development phase, including finance and budgeting * Development hell, when a proje ...

, following successful phase II trial outcomes.

History

Collaborative studies by laboratories at

Johns Hopkins School of Medicine The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (JHUSOM) is the medical school of Johns Hopkins University, a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Established in 1893 following the construction of the Johns Hopkins Hospital, th ...

and Active Biotech Research AB identified tasquinimod as the lead agent for developing a treatment for prostate cancer. Tasquinimod was one of several second-generation quinoline-3-carboxamide variants synthesized using the drug roquinimex as a starting point, and it performed well in pre-clinical studies of cancer

models A model is an informative representation of an object, person, or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin , . Models can be divided int ...

. In April 2011,

Ipsen Ipsen is a French biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Paris, France, with a focus on drug development and commercialization in three therapeutic areas: oncology, rare diseases and neuroscience. Ipsen is one of the world's top 15 biopha ...

and Active Biotech entered into a broad partnership for the co-development of tasquinimod for the treatment of cancer. Active Biotech granted Ipsen exclusive rights to commercialize tasquinimod worldwide, except in North and South America and Japan where Active Biotech retained all commercial and marketing rights.

Mechanism of action

Tasquinimod is a novel small-molecule inhibitor that targets the tumor microenvironment by controlling the accumulation and immunosuppressive, pro-angiogenic and pro-metastatic functions of regulatory myeloid cells (also called myeloid-derived suppressor cells). It binds to and inhibits the interactions of

S100A9 S100 calcium-binding protein A9 (S100A9) also known as migration inhibitory factor-related protein 14 (MRP14) or calgranulin B is a protein that in humans is encoded by the ''S100A9'' gene. The proteins S100A8 and S100A9 form a heterodimer cal ...

, an immunomodulatory protein that promotes tumor development, influences suppressive and pro-angiogenic cells in the tumor microenvironment, and participates in the establishment of pre-metastatic niches. Tasquinimod may also target the tumor microenvironment by suppressing the tumor hypoxic response, in which genes involved in the adaptation and survival of cells during hypoxia are induced. Tasquinimod reduces tumor

angiogenesis Angiogenesis is the physiological process through which new blood vessels form from pre-existing vessels, formed in the earlier stage of vasculogenesis. Angiogenesis continues the growth of the vasculature mainly by processes of sprouting and ...

; but its anti-angiogenic effects do not appear to be linked to

vascular endothelial growth factor Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF, ), originally known as vascular permeability factor (VPF), is a signal protein produced by many cells that stimulates the formation of blood vessels. To be specific, VEGF is a sub-family of growth factors ...

(VEGF) neutralization or VEGF receptor tyrosine kinase inhibition.

Clinical studies

A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase II study comparing tasquinimod with placebo in 206 men with metastatic CRPC was completed in 2009. The primary endpoint in the trial was to show a difference in the number of patients with disease progression at 6 months. The proportion of patients who were disease progression-free after 6 months was 69% for patients treated with tasquinimod versus 37% for placebo-treated patients (p<0.001). Median

progression-free survival Progression-free survival (PFS) is "the length of time during and after the treatment of a disease, such as cancer, that a patient lives with the disease but it does not get worse". In oncology, PFS usually refers to situations in which a tumor is ...

(PFS) was significantly improved in patients treated with tasquinimod compared with patients receiving placebo (7.6 vs 3.3 months; hazard ratio R0.57; 95% confidence interval I0.39, 0.85, p=0.0042). Tasquinimod thus delayed disease progression by about 4.3 months. Overall survival (OS) observed for tasquinimod-treated patients was longer than previously reported in this patient population. Median overall survival was 33.4 months for the tasquinimod group versus 30.4 months for the placebo group (p=0.49). Using a multivariate analysis, treatment with tasquinimod was associated with an OS advantage with a HR of 0.64 (95% CI 0.42, 0.97, p=0.034). It was hypothesized that the prolongation in PFS observed with tasquinimod treatment may lead to a survival advantage in men with metastatic CRPC. Also, a stronger trend for survival benefit was seen in patients with bone metastases; 34.2 for the tasquinimod group vs 27.1 months for the placebo group (HR 0.73, 95% CI 0.46, 1.17, p=0.19). Analysis of up to 3 years of safety data from phase II studies showed that treatment-related

adverse event In pharmaceuticals, an adverse event (AE) is any unexpected or harmful medical occurrence that happens to a patient during medical treatment or a clinical trial. Unlike direct side effects, an adverse event does not necessarily mean the medicati ...

s were mild to moderate, manageable and less frequent after 2 months of therapy. Adverse events observed included gastrointestinal disorders, fatigue, musculoskeletal pain as well as elevations of some laboratory parameters. A phase III randomized controlled trial called 10TASQ10 to confirm tasquinimod’s effect on disease progression is ongoing. More than 1,200 patients with asymptomatic to mildly symptomatic metastatic CRPC were successfully enrolled in the study, as planned in the clinical protocol. The study is expected to complete in 2016. Other indications are currently under investigation.

References

{{reflist Experimental cancer drugs 2-Quinolone ethers at the benzene ring Trifluoromethyl compounds Quinolinols Anilides