The company announced the initiation a of a drug discovery program towards the identification of novel oral drugs specifically designed to treat infections caused by Corona viruses.
Recent scientific publications have identified the protein ACE2 (angiotensin converting enzyme 2) as the protein enabling the virus entry into the human epithelial cells of the lungs.
Palobiofarma would like to capitalize on the company experience dealing with structure-based design of novel drugs, looking for ACE2 modulators that blocks the binding of the virus to the ACE2 protein. This approach will render a novel drug to specifically treat future outbreaks caused any virus using the ACE2 protein as the entry point into the human body.
The program has been selected by the Spanish Government organization CDTI as one of the most attractive approach to fight the virus, providing Palobiofarma a financial support of over one million euros to discover and develop this new drug.