Biomica Reports Positive Results from Pre-Clinical Studies in its Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) Program

 Biomica, reported today positive results from pre-clinical studies in its IBD program. In these studies, Biomica tested its optimized drug candidate BMC333, which consists of four live bacterial strains derived from Biomica’s drug candidates BMC321 and BMC322, which had been previously tested as well. Treatment with these drug candidates demonstrated efficacy in several studies in reducing inflammation for the treatment of IBD.

IBD includes conditions such as ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease, which are chronic, debilitating, non-infectious, inflammatory diseases of the digestive tract. However, despite the introduction of new modalities and therapeutics, many patients do not completely respond, and others’ response may diminish over time[1]. The global IBD treatment market size was valued at USD 19.2 billion in 2020[2].

Earlier this year, initial positive pre-clinical results pointing to reduction of inflammation following treatment with BMC321 and BMC322, were achieved using a DSS-induced colitis mouse model. These results were presented at the 2021 Crohn’s & Colitis Congress, jointly organized by the American Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation (CCFA) and the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA)[3]. Additional positive results were obtained in an IL-10 knock-out model performed in collaboration with the laboratory of Prof. R. Balfour Sartor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, USA, which demonstrated reduced inflammatory scores in histological assessment.

Following the insights provided by these pre-clinical studies, Biomica developed BMC333, an optimized combination of four of the strains originally present in BMC321 and BMC322. The optimization was supported by the use of PRISM, a proprietary high-resolution computational microbiome analysis platform for the identification of microbial functions and strains, powered by Evogene’s Microboost AI platform, with specific emphasis on the functional capabilities of the selected bacterial strains.

The results Biomica is currently reporting follow the evaluation of BMC333 in a DSS-induced colitis model, which demonstrated BMC333’s ability to significantly reduce intestinal tissue damage resulting from inflammation. BMC333 attenuated intestinal inflammation as observed in several key parameters such as reduced fecal lipocalin and reduced inflammation observed in histopathological analysis. Moreover, animals treated with BMC333 demonstrated increased survival rates compared to the untreated group. 

Looking forward, Biomica expects to begin the scale-up development processes of BMC333 in 2022, in preparation for the production of an initial clinical batch. In parallel, BMC333 is expected to undergo additional pre-clinical studies, including in collaboration with the laboratory of Prof. R. Balfour Sartor.