PolyU’s anti-cancer drug research to bring commercial and health benefits

ABCT researchers have played a significant role in cancer research over the years and have led to the development of new anti-cancer drugs. Pegtomarginase, which was initially developed by the research team led by Professors Thomas Leung and Thomas Lo in the Department of Applied Biology and Chemical Technology and Lo Ka Chung Research Center for Natural Anti-Cancer Drug Development at PolyU, is further developed and exploited by Avalon Polytom and Athenex for the treatment of patients with advanced malignancies.

They received U.S. FDA allowance of Investigational New Drug (IND) Application in 2019, and this second-generation human arginase (PT01 – Pegtomarginase) is further granted to enter into clinical trial phrase 1, a significant milestone for this anti-cancer drug development with researchers’ innovation and strong execution capabilities at the companies commitment to commercializing novel technologies for the treatment of a wide range of cancers.