Contact Details: Dr. Shmulik Hess Co-Founder & CEO shmulik@meytavti.co.il

Status:

Active P^X was founded as a Meytav Incubator portfolio company on August 2008. The company develops proprietary novel oral available peptide drugs to treat Diabetes and for pain management.

Sector and field of activity

Drug Development, Therapy for metabolic diseases & pain management.

Underlying science and technology:

As a result of major advances in organic chemistry and in molecular biology, many bioactive peptides can now be prepared in quantities sufficient for pharmacological and clinical use. Thus, in the last few years’ new methods have been established for the treatment and diagnosis of illnesses in which peptides have been implicated.

However, the use of peptides as therapeutic and diagnostic agents is limited by several factors: a) low tissue penetration; b) low metabolic stability due to proteolytic degradation in the gastrointestinal tract and in serum; c) poor absorption after oral ingestion, in particular due to their relatively high molecular mass or the lack of specific transport systems or both; d) rapid excretion through the liver and kidneys; and e) undesired side effects in non-target organ systems, since peptide receptors can be widely distributed in-vivo.

It is therefore desirable to achieve peptide analogs with improved oral absorption and greater specificity thereby achieving enhanced clinical bioavailability and selectivity. It is most beneficial to produce conformational constrained peptide analogs overcoming the drawbacks of the native peptide molecules, thereby providing improved therapeutic properties.

Active P^X aims to develop novel peptidic molecules to be utilized as non-invasive therapeutics. These peptidic molecules are proprietary derivatives of known bioactive peptides, designed to enable an optimal profile of bioavailability and selectivity, while preserving the full functional capacity of the original sequences.

The peptidic molecules are derivatives of physiologically active peptides. Such peptides are short linear sequences, with well-known characteristics and functional profiles. Their biological activities have been studied and their therapeutic utility demonstrated in pre-clinical models and even clinical studies.

The peptidic molecules in development are designed to enable two principal characteristics – they exhibit a robust resistance to proteolytic degradation, and an enhanced absorption profile compared to the native sequences. This allows not only the development of orally available compounds, but also an improved pharmacokinetic profile, as a result of longer serum half-life.

The design and synthesis of the peptidic molecules utilizes an innovative technology, involving the backbone cyclization of peptides. The technology introduces a novel conceptual approach to the conformational constraint of peptides. The theoretical and proven advantages of this strategy include the ability to affect cyclization via the peptide backbone without interfering with side chains that may be crucial for interaction with the specific receptor of a given peptide.

Team mangment:

Dr. Shmulik Hess Co-Founder & CEO

Prof. Chaim Gilon Co-Founder

Board of Directors:

Mr. Yehuda Zelig, Senior VP Global operations Scigen LTD

Dr. Avri Havron, CEO Modigen LTD

Dr.Yigal Koltin, former VP of Millennium Pharmaceuticals Inc. Dr Koltin served as Associate Director at SmithKline Beckman/ Beecham.