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About Radiotherapeutics

The transformation of
radiation oncology.

For over a century, radiation (i.e., ionizing radiation) has been the backbone of cancer treatment – with about half of all patients with cancer receiving it at some point.1 Radiation is so toxic to cancer cells that theoretically, it could be curative were a high enough dose delivered and retained.
In recent years, radiotherapeutics have been developed as a way to deliver radiation therapy directly and specifically to cancer cells. An explosion of new studies shows the potential of these therapies to destroy tumor tissue, even at a microscopic level, and yet reduce both short- and long-term side effects.

External Beam Radiation Therapy (EBRT)

Internal Targeted Radiotherapeutics

However, the traditional and most common delivery of radiation is external (from outside the body), making it impossible not to hit normal tissue when directed at the tumor. As a result, patients often suffer devastating toxicity levels that cause loss of taste, hair loss, skin changes, and numerous other complications.

As clinical data continues to demonstrate survival and quality of life benefits over current standards of care, the global radiotherapeutics market is expected to grow in size from $1.6B in 2021 to $4.6B in 2027, representing 18% compounded annual growth.2

What are radiotherapeutics?

The Benefits

With internal radiation therapy, a radiation source is put inside the body via injection, infusion, inhalation or ingestion. Brachytherapy involves low- or high-dose temporary or permanent radioactive implants placed in or near the tumor while systemic therapy involves liquid radiation that travels in the blood to tissues, seeking out the tumor.

Both approaches can be very effective in treating cancer as alpha or beta radiation is delivered locally with a high level of accuracy while minimizing the risk of side effects due to the targeted and precise delivery of radiation.

Further, they require very short treatment times (1-5 days) with radiation kept in place between a few minutes to a lifetime.

Radionuclide-based therapies contain either beta, alpha or gamma energy emitters. In some cases, a single radionuclide can act as a mixed emitter of more than one type of energy. Within these classifications, radionuclides have a variety of tissue ranges, half-lives, and chemistries, each creating the opportunity to tailor a therapy’s properties to the unmet needs of certain patients or cancer types.

The Challenges

Some of the shortcomings of existing radiotherapeutics include the path length of certain emitters extending too far into healthy tissue, insignificant retention of the drug at the site of administration, a lack of affordability or convenience in administration, and drug carriers that are not biodegradable or biocompatible.

Our Approach

How we’re overcoming
complications in safety
and efficacy.

Our radiotherapeutic platform leverages the versatile radionuclide, Rhenium, which has a 17-hour (Rhenium-188) to 90-hour (Rhenium-186) and emits both beta and gamma energy, leading to combined therapeutic and image monitoring benefits.

We have developed innovative formulas using BMEDA-chelation, nanotechnology and microtechnology to encapsulate Rhenium isotopes and facilitate non-toxic release in the body.

Leveraging established, targeted delivery techniques, we seek to inject high doses of radiation directly into or near a cancer tumor, where it sufficiently destroys the tumor while sparing healthy surrounding tissue.

Our goal is to improve and extend the lives of patients with rare and difficult-to-treat cancers.

1 https://www.cancer.gov/news-events/cancer-currents-blog/2020/radiopharmaceuticals-cancer-radiation-therapy

2Source: IQ4I Nuclear Medicine/Radiopharmaceuticals Global Market Report

ReSPECT Clinical Trials