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NewsNovember 20, 2006 NST NeuroSurvival Technologies Ltd. has announced the closing of an additional financing round, in continuation of the company's financing round of February this year, in which Teva Pharmaceuticals and existing company shareholders have participated. The current round was performed with the participation of the US funds Ziegler-Meditech Equity Partners (ZMEP) and HighBridge Capital. Within their investment in NST, Dr. Morry Blumenfeld of Meditech will join the company's Board of Directors. Dr. Blumenfeld brings to NST Board decades of experience as a leader in the area of Diagnostic Imaging, through his former capacity as a technology founder and leader in GE Medical Systems. Parallel to its financing round, NST has successfully completed its First-in-Human safety study in Europe , with its leading product, ApoSense -PET, and has successfully commenced efficacy studies in molecular imaging of cell death in patients with cerebral stroke. NST develops technologies in the area of Apoptosis, which is a genetically programmed process of cell death, inherent in every cell in the body, which, upon its activation, leads a controlled process of cell "suicide". This process is a fundamental biological processes which has unique importance both in healthy life, as a tool for the elimination of defected cells, such as cancer cells, as well as in different disease states. NST focuses on using the this powerful biological process for advancing clinical diagnosis and therapy in a range of medical disorders, such as cerebral stroke, cancer, neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's Disease or Multiple Sclerosis, or Congestive Heart Failure. The company has developed a set of novel compounds called ApoSense , that selectively target cells undergoing apoptosis, thus enabling the molecular imaging of disease processes or the selective targeting of drugs to foci of disease, for targeted therapy. The company's first product, ApoSense -PET, is a clinical molecular imaging agent, designed for the early, non-invasive diagnosis of disease and monitoring of treatment, through the molecular imaging of the cell death processes related to the disease. Analysts estimate the market potential for this technology at about $5Bn annually. In the imaging procedure, ApoSense -PET is injected intravenously to the patient, where it selectively targets cells and tissues undergoing apoptosis, and non-invasively reports on the extent of such process through an attached imaging marker. This signal is measured by the PET (Positron Emission Tomography) imaging modality, hence allowing imaging of the process in-vivo . This development paves the way to enhanced diagnosis of disease course and treatment effect, as well as the possibility of optimization of treatment in real-time, along the principles of the vision of Personalized Medicine, whereby treatment is individually tailored for each patient, according to his / her medical state and genetic profile. The first clinical study with ApoSense -PET was conducted with healthy volunteers, and demonstrated the safety, stability and biodistribution of the compound in the body, in a manner favorable for a molecular imaging agent. On the basis of these results, the company has received regulatory approval to proceed to the second stage of the clinical studies, for the detection of foci of cell death in the brain of patients with cerebral stroke. A number of patients have been studied to date, and in all of them ApoSense -PET successfully demonstrated the foci of cell death. In parallel, the company continues its collaboration with Teva Pharmaceuticals Ltd., for the development of novel anti-cancer therapies based on the company's technology. The Chairman of NST Board of Directors is Mr. Eli Hurvitz, who has also invested in the company through Pontifax fund. Among the company shareholders are also Bargal R&D Investments, Federman Holdings, Johnson & Johnson Development Corp., Teva Pharmaceuticals Ltd, Clal Biotechnology Industries, The Israeli Phoenix, Docor fund (of the Van-Leer foundation), Polar Investments, Israel Land Development Co. and Technorov Investments.
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