Synthetic Glycoamines as Antimetastatic Drugs

The objective of Phase I is to select a small number (3 - 5) of synthetic compounds with high biological activities as inhibitors of cancer cell aggregation, adhesion, detachment and spreading (motility). These compounds will be selected from a panel of 20 currently available synthetic structural analogs of glycoamines. Glycoamines are a recently discovered new family of endogenous amino acid-sugar copolymers with high anti-cell aggregation and antimetastatic activity as demonstrated with animal models of cancer. Human breast carcinoma and melanoma tissue will be used as a source of cancer cells; in preliminary studies HPLC-purified natural and synthetic glycoamines have shown a desired inhibitory activities against those types of human cancer. The studies will be performed using an individual human tumor and in vitro cancer cell aggregation assay (cell adhesion and aggregation study) and tissue culture assay (cell detachment and spreading/motility study). The results of the Phase I studies will set the stage for Phase II which will involve extended in vitro and in vivo (nude mice model) studies on human cancer. These studies have with a selected number of synthetic inhibitors with emphasis on the development and preclinical evaluation of a new family of antimetastatic drugs. Phase III will comprise a patent application, clinical trials and commercialization stages of the desired product(s).