ISU Abxis has presented the preclinical trial results for ISU104, an anti-ErbB3 antibody biomarker against the cancers with Neuregulin 1 (NRG1)-overexpression, NRG1-fusion, or oncogenic ErbB3 mutations, at the American Association for Cancer Research 2020 conference.

A biomarker is an indicator that can detect changes in the body through proteins, DNA, RNA, and metabolites. Companies apply it as an objective measurement marker that can pre-evaluate and predict the patient's response to drugs before treatment. It also has attracted the attention of the developers of new anticancer drugs recently as the means to overcome the difference in treatment effect in patients.

ISU104 is a monoclonal antibody that inhibits cancer cell growth by inhibiting the binding of ErbB3 with the ligand heregulin or NRG1 to prevent dimer formation with EGFR or ErbB2.

According to the company, there are no anticancer drugs on the market that target ErbB3, which is one of the leading causes of resistance to existing anticancer drugs. The company expects its candidate will show efficacy in treating cancer that has developed resistance to standard therapy.

ISU Abxis completed the recruitment of patients for its phase 1 clinical trial to confirm the efficacy of ISU104 in March and plans to announce the final trial results early next year.