Case Western Reserve University has entered into a licensing agreement with a Vancouver company with the goal of developing therapies for spinal-cord injuries and other nerve-damage conditions.
The university said on its The Daily site that it will work with NervGen Pharma Corp. “to research, develop and commercialize a patented technology with potential to bring new therapies for spinal-cord injury and other conditions associated with nerve damage.”
Specific terms of the licensing agreement were not disclosed. Case Western Reserve said the technology was developed in the laboratory of Jerry Silver, a spinal-cord injury and regenerative medicine researcher at the university.
Silver’s research “has implicated protein tyrosine phosphatase sigma (PTPs) as a key neural receptor which inhibits nerve regeneration through regions of scarring in spinal-cord injury and other medical conditions,” The Daily post stated. “Targeted treatment against PTPs with an agent known as ISP promoted regeneration of damaged nerves and functional improvement in animal models for various medical conditions. A series of receptor antagonists that can be delivered systemically have been identified, including an analogue of ISP that is ready for clinical development.”
NervGen CEO Ernest Wong said in a state
