Onzima Ventures
plc
("Onzima" or the "Company")
Investee company N4 Pharma
announces latest research results for Nuvec®
Change of
registered office
N4 Pharma Limited (“N4 Pharma”), in which Onzima holds a 49%
equity stake, has announced that it has successfully demonstrated
in-vitro transfection efficiency for its Nuvec® DNA vaccine system
comparable to industry standard transfection reagents.
Its latest results show that optimised Nuvec® particles achieved
80-90% transfection efficiency in HEK 293 cells, the same levels as
Lipofectamine 2000.
These results can be found here:
http://www.n4pharma.co.uk/download/i/mark_dl/u/4013008883/4630405716/nuvec%20dna%20transfection%20results%201.pdf
N4 Pharma CEO Nigel Theobald
commented:
“Our research on our Nuvec® particles continues to show
impressive results. Lipofectamine is widely used for DNA
transfection experiments as it achieves high levels of in-vitro
transfection efficiency however it has been demonstrated to have
negative toxic effects on cells so is not used in commercial
product development for in-vivo administration.
We are continuing to build our evidence on Nuvec towards
establishing its acceptability as an in-vivo delivery vector for
DNA and RNA based vaccines. Our next steps are to compare the
toxicity of Nuvec® with lipofectamine® where we expect to
show markedly lower toxicity of our particles making them more
suitable for in-vivo use.
We are clearly able to demonstrate high transfection levels,
which opens up the potential for longer term use of Nuvec® as an
in-vivo transfection agent for DNA vaccines. Our R&D program is
designed step by step to build the supporting case for this
application for the nuvec® system.
This latest data represents strong steady progress on the path
towards commercialisation of Nuvec®. We expect further results
comparing the toxicity and transfection efficiency of Nuvec®
against a wider range of existing transfection agents in a
range of different cell types, over the next 3 or 4 months
including comparison against those vectors already established for
in-vivo use. ”
The Company also announces that its registered office has now
changed to 6th Floor, 60 Gracechurch Street, London EC3V 0HR.
For further information please contact:
Onzima Ventures PLC
Tel: +44 (0) 1732 366 561
Gavin Burnell, Luke Cairns
Nominated Adviser
Cairn Financial Advisers LLP
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7 213 0880
Sandy Jamieson, Liam Murray
Broker
Peterhouse Corporate Finance Limited
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7469 0930
Guy Miller, Lucy Williams