ORIC Pharmaceuticals, a privately held oncology company focused on the discovery and development of drugs to address treatment resistant cancers, announced that the first subject in a phase 1a clinical study has been dosed with ORIC-101, a potent small molecule inhibitor of the glucocorticoid receptor (GR).
Activation of GR allows tumor cells to circumvent current cancer therapies, and suppresses the immune system’s ability to recognize tumor cells.
ORIC-101 was discovered and tested by ORIC’s internal research team, based in part on early work by Dr. Charles Sawyers, one of ORIC’s founders, that linked GR to anti-androgen resistance in castration-resistant prostate cancer.
The Phase 1a study of ORIC-101, currently underway in the United States, is designed to assess the safety, pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of ORIC-101 in healthy volunteers. “The ORIC-101 program is the result of our research to characterize the role of the glucocorticoid receptor axis in therapy resistance, and to target it with a small molecule therapeutic,” said Valeria Fantin, PhD, ORIC’s chief scientific officer. “As we take this first step into the clinic, we look forward to understanding how ORIC-101 may improve oncology therapy in the future.”
ORIC is continuing to assess activity of ORIC-101 across a wide range of cancer models. The results of those studies and of the current phase 1a will inform future development of ORIC-101.
