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VGX Pharmaceuticals and Dowpharma Sign Research and Development Agreement for VGX's Lead Cancer Compound

02 Mar 2006 - VGX Pharmaceuticals and DowpharmaSM contract manufacturing services, a business unit of The Dow Chemical Company, announced they have signed a Research and Development Agreement to advance the development of VGX-100, VGX's novel cancer compound in pre-clinical development. Under the terms of the agreement, Dowpharma will perform a feasibility study for the expression of VGX-100, a VGX proprietary protein, using Pfnex Expression Technology(TM), a Pseudomonas-based technology from Dowpharma, utilizing multiple Pseudomonas fluorescens strains. Pfnex Expression Technology accelerates speed to market for vaccines and biotherapeutics by improving quality, boosting yields of protein expression, and reducing the cost of existing microbial systems.
 
VGX Pharmaceuticals has discovered that specific viral proteins can induce selective apoptosis in rapidly dividing cancer cells without affecting normal cells. Preclinical studies have found that VGX-100, a recombinant Viral protein r (Vpr), induces tumor death through apoptosis in a variety of established human tumor cells derived from the breast, prostate, brain, and other sources. The initial clinical studies will target individuals with Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma.