Bolder BioTechnology receives $600,000 NIH SBIR grant to study long-acting IL-11 analog in ARS

Aug 18 2010

Bolder BioTechnology, Inc. today announced that it has been awarded a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant totaling $600,000 from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) of The National Institutes of Health (NIH).  The grant will be used to demonstrate the feasibility of using our novel, long-acting IL-11 analog to accelerate platelet recovery and improve survival in a mouse model of Acute Radiation Syndrome (ARS).  Receipt of the entire grant award is contingent upon the achievement of certain research milestones.

"Development of radiological/nuclear countermeasures to treat ARS is a high priority research area for NIAID," said George (Joe) Cox, Ph.D., Company President and Principal Investigator for the grant.  "We are delighted to receive a grant award from NIAID to conduct research with our long-acting IL-11 analog in ARS."  

Bone marrow is one of the most sensitive tissues to radiation damage and impaired production of blood cells is one of the first clinical signs of excessive radiation exposure, often resulting in death.  IL-11 is a protein that stimulates bone marrow cells to divide and differentiate into platelets.  Recent studies indicate that IL-11 can mitigate some of the hematopoietic and gastrointestinal complications of radiation exposure and improve survival in animal models of ARS.  IL-11 has a short half-life in humans, which necessitates daily dosing, and may not optimize therapeutic benefits of the protein for patients.  A long-acting IL-11 analog that does not require frequent dosing could provide significant treatment advantages in a nuclear emergency setting.

The NIH SBIR program is a peer-reviewed grant program that provides research support to small businesses to discover and develop innovative biomedical products for the treatment of serious unmet medical needs.