RS Research Announces First Patient Dosed in Phase I Clinical Trial of RS-0139 in NSCLC

20 December 2021

RS Research, a clinical-stage biotechnology start-up developing smart nanomedicines for targeted chemotherapy aiming to provide cancer patients with an optimal therapeutic index, announced that the first patient has been dosed in the Phase I clinical trial evaluating the safety of RS-0139 in NSCLC.

RS Research was founded by Prof. Rana Sanyal and Sena Nomak as an academic spin-off from Boğaziçi University to take the necessary R&D and commercialization steps for bringing innovative therapies to patients. The company recently announced their Series-A investment round worth 12 million USD. The proceeds from the A-round will be used for the development of the five drug candidates in the company’s portfolio. The compounds are based on the proprietary platform technology Sagitta^TM, which are nanocarriers with versatile targeting capability and suitable for loading a single or a combination of chemotherapeutic agents. As a result, the portfolio members have better pharmacokinetic profiles while the targeting enables the drugs to accumulate in the tumor ensuring an enhanced therapeutic index and thus offering reduced side effect profile, a “Cure with A Smile”. Sagitta^TM allows designing targeted drug candidates for different indications, which yields into development of the company’s own portfolio as well as an important co-development potential.

RS-0139 is the lead candidate in the portfolio, aiming to deliver docetaxel specifically into NSCLC tumors. The ongoing Phase I clinical trial is conducted in Turkey and is aiming to determine the optimum dose, pharmacokinetics, and the safety of RS-0139 in patients with a recurrent, locally advanced or metastatic NSCLC. Further details regarding the clinical trial are available at clinicaltrials.gov with the trial identifier NCT04261413.

RS Research
RS Research was founded by Prof. Rana Sanyal and Sena Nomak to take the necessary steps for bringing innovative therapies to patients, carrying out the research to clinic based on the proprietary drug delivery platforms Sagitta^TM Bir and Sagitta^TM Dui, patents covering 58 countries. Thanks to this technology, RS Research can increase effectiveness of chemotherapy and reduce side effects. The nanomedicine taken into the cell thanks to the targeting module that recognizes the receptors on the tumor surface, releases the active substance here, showing its full effect only to the tumor. The nanomedicine is released only when it is in the tumor after the targeting moiety recognize the cell surface receptors. RS Research raised 2 million Euros seed funding in 2017, followed by 12 million USD Series-A investment round in 2021. The company developed 5 drug candidates designed based on Sagitta^TM platform technology addressing multiple indications in its pipeline. The Phase I clinical trial of the leading drug candidate which received the first ever approval by the MoH to move towards clinical trials in Turkey is ongoing in two clinical research centers since May 2021. RS Research’s clean room with both synthesis and filling capability was granted GMP license by the MoH for clinical batch lyophilized oncology drugs in August 2021.

For detailed information:

ozgecesur@rsresearch.net