Image of a murine kidney with autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease. Image acquired with the fluorescent slide scanning services of the Monash Histology Platform.
xCystence Bio, a Monash University biotech company, has secured a top-up funding boost from Brandon BioCatalyst's CUREator incubator to drive the development of urgently needed therapeutics for Polycystic Kidney Disease (PKD).
Top-up funding rounds recognise innovations that received initial seed funding from CUREator and have gone on to demonstrate substantial progress. The top-up brings CUREator's total grant funding awarded to xCystence Bio to AU$750,000.
Led by the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute (BDI) and the Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences (MIPS), xCystence Bio highlights the importance of backing spin-out companies by enabling them to translate early-stage discoveries into practical, commercial endpoints that deliver better health outcomes and grow Australia's biotechnology community.
PKD is a family of genetic diseases in which multiple large cysts form in the kidneys. It's a progressive condition which typically worsens over a patient's lifetime and is one of the leading causes of renal failure requiring dialysis or transplant.
xCystence Bio was originally identified by CUREator as an early-stage biomedical innovation with long-term potential due to the group's identification of a cell signalling pathway which is active in PKD and which, when blocked in PKD disease models, prevents the formation of new cysts and the growth of existing ones.
The top-up funding moves the program to the next crucial stage of providing proof of concept in treating the disease.
Founders include BDI's Professor Ian Smyth and Dr Denny Cottle, along with Professor Paul Stupple and Dr Yichao Zhao from MIPS.
Co-founder Professor Stupple from MIPS said there's a significant need for new PKD treatments as current management focuses on addressing symptoms, rather than curing the disease itself.
"Around 12 million people worldwide are affected by PKD, with the disease often leading to kidney failure requiring treatments such as dialysis or even transplantation. Our mission at xCystence Bio is to develop and optimise new safe and effective drugs to significantly improve quality of life for those living with PKD," Professor Stupple said.
Professor Smyth, xCystence Bio co-founder from BDI said since establishing the company the team has made significant advances in developing a new family of drugs to treat PKD.
"Forming xCystence Bio has given our research team the opportunity to continue optimising towards PKD drug candidates and progress them through the crucial preclinical process toward the next stage of clinical development," Professor Smyth said.
Chief Commercialisation Officer at Monash Innovation, Dr Alastair Hick, said Monash excels as a vehicle through which research discoveries can be translated into real-world impact.
"Investing in early stage research is a vital step in progressing next-generation medicines toward becoming practical applications that address major health challenges while also driving economic growth. It's fantastic to see yet another Monash-led biotech company supported by CUREator funding to maximise the chance of making a real difference to those living with PKD," Dr Hick said.
Aoife Cullen, Head of Commercialisation - Life Sciences at Monash Innovation, said "This investment is a testament to the potential impact of xCystence Bio in addressing PKD, as well as Monash's expertise in taking innovative research from the lab to clinical application."
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