Novogen Files Suite of Patents for Anti-Tropomyosin Drug Technology

Novogen Limited

today announced the filing of a family of provisional patents in the US covering anti-tropomyosin (ATM) drug technology. ATM drugs represent an entirely novel approach to anti-cancer therapy, blocking the ability of cancer cells to divide and doing so in a highly cancer-specific way. Based on their action, ATMs belong to a class of anti-cancer drug known as anti-mitotics. Current anti-mitotic drugs are taxanes and vinca alkaloids and remain among the most widely prescribed anti-cancer drugs after 40 years of use. "Filing these patents represents a critical step for the Company in protecting such a potentially valuable piece of intellectual property," said Graham Kelly, PhD, Novogen CEO. "Taxanes continue to dominate anti-cancer therapy even though they recently came off-patent. We believe that ATM drugs have the ability to replace taxanes and to become the next generation of anti-mitotic drugs." Tropomyosin is a protein found in actin filaments, a key component of the cytoskeleton of a cell. Actin filaments provide a cell with the ability to contract. One of the ways that contraction serves a cell is during cell division when separation of the two daughter cells occurs by the formation