NEW YORK – Tessellate Bio on Monday announced a collaboration with Children's Medical Research Institute (CMRI), a pediatric medical research institute in Australia, and Omico, a network of cancer institutes in Australia and New Zealand, to research alternative lengthening of telomeres (ALT) across tumor types.
The collaboration will focus on improving the understanding of ALT in cancer, a mechanism that some cancer cells use to maintain the integrity of their telomeres during cell division that can contribute to these cells' unlimited replicative potential. Researchers will explore the prevalence of ALT in cancer and the genetic factors involved with these ALT-associated tumors. The groups hope to accelerate development of precision medicine approaches to ALT cancers.
Researchers have already used data collected by Omico to explore ALT prevalence in primary tissue samples utilizing the C-Circle assay developed by researchers in Australia. The initial results of the collaboration between Tessellate, CMRI, and Omico suggest that ALT is present in cancers that were previously not associated with this mechanism.
Tessellate Bio, based in Amsterdam, is focused on developing synthetic lethality therapies for ALT and tumor suppressor loss-of-function cancers. Tessellate CSO Jurgen Moll said in a statement that the collaboration will help the firm identify patient populations with tumors driven by ALT to develop treatments. Tessellate also aims to validate the C-Circle assay to detect ALT-driven tumors.
"Synthetic lethality has huge potential for the development of new cancer therapies but has so far been directed to only a small proportion of cancer types by targeting of homologous recombination deficiency (HRD)," CMRI CEO Roger Reddel said in a statement. "This collaboration has been established to make a meaningful contribution to expanding lethality beyond HRD into ALT-positive cancers through the development of new therapies and associated companion diagnostics."