Spring Bank Announces Collaborative Research Agreement with University of Texas Southwestern Medical School 

Spring Bank Pharmaceuticals, Inc. recently announced that it has entered into a research agreement with the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School (UTSW) to evaluate Spring Bank’s novel small molecule STING antagonist compounds.

Spring Bank has entered into a collaborative research agreement with the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center for the evaluation of Spring Bank’s STimulator of INterferon Gene (STING) antagonist compounds. Dr. Nan Yan, as Principal Investigator, will evaluate Spring Bank’s STING antagonist compounds in autoimmune disease models.

“There is a significant unmet medical need for the treatment of diseases where the cGAS-STING pathway is dysregulated. We are excited to collaborate with Spring Bank in the evaluation of these novel STING antagonist compounds in mouse models of autoimmune and inflammatory diseases,” stated Dr. Nan Yan, Associate Professor and Rita C. and William P. Clements, Jr. Scholar in Medical Research at the UTSW Medical Center.

Spring Bank is designing its STING antagonist compounds to block aberrant STING-dependent signaling by a novel mechanism of action. These compounds are being developed to have therapeutic utility in certain autoimmune diseases, including various interferonopathies.

“We are excited to work with the scientists from UTSW as we advance our STING antagonist program,” said Kris Iyer, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer and Co-Founder of Spring Bank. “Dr. Yan is considered a leading expert in autoimmune and inflammatory diseases, and this collaborative research will enhance our knowledge of the non-clinical efficacy profile of novel compounds from our STING antagonist R&D program.”

About Spring Bank Pharmaceuticals
Spring Bank Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company engaged in the discovery and development of a novel class of therapeutics using its proprietary small molecule nucleotide platform. The company designs its compounds to selectively target and modulate the activity of specific proteins implicated in various disease states. The company’s lead product candidate, inarigivir, is being developed for the treatment of chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV). Inarigivir is designed to activate within hepatic cells retinoic acid-inducible gene 1 (RIG-I), which has been shown to inhibit HBV viral replication and induce the intracellular interferon signaling pathways for antiviral defense. The company is also developing its lead STING agonist product candidate, SB 11285, an immunotherapeutic agent for the treatment of selected cancers. For more information, please visit www.springbankpharm.com.