The acute care products for infectious diseases and cardiovascular disorders being developed by emerging biotechnology company Polymedix in Radnor have steadily moved through clinical trials the past five years.
With one shot in the arm from a Department of Defense outfit earlier this month, Polymedix is poised to make a real impact, and make it in a hurry. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) awarded Polymedix a $1.6 million contract to develop new antibiotic compounds to combat biowarfare pathogens. The contract will support four full-time scientists, providing Polymedix with a chance to do something for which otherwise it wouldn’t have the capability.
“The risk posed by biowarfare and other pathogens such as anthrax, plague and tulameria is real and significant, both to military personnel and the public in general,” says Landekic, who founded Polymedix in 2002 with Dr. William DeGrado of the University of Pennsylvania.
Biodefense applications are one of many potentially important applications of Polymedix’s novel defensin-mimetic antimicrobial compounds, which represent an entirely new class of antibiotic drugs. Polymedix has imitated nature and mimics the activity and structure of host defense proteins. The company’s defensin-mimetic polymer biomaterials have the possibility to make surfaces and materials inherently self-sterilizing and antimicrobial, killing pathogens on contact.
Drug-resistant bacterial infections are considered an increasingly serious medical problems and ranks as the second-leading cause of death worldwide including 100,000 annually in the U.S. Landekic believes with additional funding, Polymedix can help stem that tide.
“There are many important products in our pipeline which can be developed that can save lives as well as reduce healthcare costs,” he says.
Source: Nicholas Landekic, Polymedix
Writer: Joe Petrucci
