24 July 2018 – C4X Discovery Holdings plc (AIM:C4XD), a pioneering drug discovery company, is pleased to announce that C4X Discovery's C4X3256 programme has been awarded a grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA, a division of National Institute of Health (NIH)). The grant of approximately $480k will support the pre-clinical development of C4X3256 in cocaine use disorder, an additional addiction indication with high unmet need. Recently licensed to Indivior, C4X3256, an oral Orexin-1 receptor antagonist, has demonstrated an excellent safety profile and preclinical efficacy in models of nicotine addiction.
An estimated 1.5 million adults are suffering from cocaine use disorder in the US alone. Current therapy relies on behavioural approaches, while most medications used in in-patient addiction treatment rehabilitation centers are indicated for other conditions and are associated with poor tolerability. Orexin-1 receptor antagonists present a new mechanism for the potential treatment of craving and/or prevention of relapse in cocaine addiction.
Supported by the grant from NIDA, C4X Discovery will investigate the efficacy of C4X3256 in preclinical selfadministration and reinstatement models of cocaine seeking and taking behaviours seen as analogous to those seen in cocaine use disorder. The preclinical studies will be co-ordinated by C4X Discovery via its drug discovery CRO network, with the support of its development partner, Indivior. The one-year project is expected to begin in Q3 2018.
This research is supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number R01DA043898. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.