UW series
Optimize late lead compounds of the UW series until pre-clinical candidate nomination
current phase of drug development
updated 14 Mar 2024
New candidates are needed to fill the research and development pipeline for Chagas disease treatments. The UW series is a novel series of T. cruzi inhibitors identified by Fred Buckner and his group at University of Washington. In 2020, they partnered with the University of Dundee Drug Discovery Unit, GSK, and DNDi to further optimize this scaffold, with the aim of nominating a pre-clinical candidate to advance to the next stages of development. This series shows a promising efficacy profile associated with a novel mode of action, and representatives from the newer generation of late leads are among the very few compounds that can provide single-compound cure in an in vivo model of chronic Chagas disease.
Project updates
2023
DNDi continued work with the alliance to further optimize and de-risk a new generation of compounds related to the original UW series and chemically diverse backup series.
2022
Compound optimization of the UW series, aimed at the nomination of a pre-clinical candidate to advance to the next stage of development, progressed through 2022 with several leads showing improved properties and confirmation of single-compound cure in bioluminescent in vivo models. A chemically diverse backup series of compounds sharing the same putative mode of action were identified and are being optimized in parallel.
2021
Compound optimization of the UW-series with a focus on optimizing the drug property profile of series compounds progressed significantly in 2021. A second generation of compounds has been confirmed to provide single-compound cure in an in vivo model of chronic Chagas disease up to 180 days after infection.
2020
Efforts continued but were heavily impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
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