Lycera Management to Present at Upcoming Conferences

PLYMOUTH, Mich.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Lycera Corp., a biopharmaceutical company pioneering innovative approaches to developing novel oral medicines to treat autoimmune diseases, today announced that the company will present at the following industry conferences this fall:

  • BioPharm America™ 2011, being held Sept. 7-9 at the Westin Boston Waterfront in Boston. Gary D. Glick, Ph.D., founder and chief scientific officer of Lycera Corp., and Werner E. Bachmann professor of chemistry at the University of Michigan, will give a company overview during the Autoimmune/Inflammation company presentation track at 9:15 a.m. on Friday, Sept. 9.
  • BioNetwork West 2011, being held Oct. 24-26 at the Ritz Carlton in Laguna Niguel, Calif. Julia C. Owens, Ph.D., senior vice president, corporate development and strategy, Lycera Corp., and Suzanne Miller Mandala, Ph.D., senior director, franchise licensing integrator, external scientific affair, Merck & Co., will present the case study “Merck and Lycera Collaborate on Anti-Inflammatory Discovery Deal” at 12:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 25.

In this presentation, Drs. Owens and Mandala will discuss Lycera’s exclusive research collaboration with Merck to discover, develop and commercialize small molecules that target T-helper 17 cells, key mediators of inflammation, through the inhibition of RORγt. The collaboration’s focus is on developing drug candidates that have the potential to treat major autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis, inflammatory bowel disease and multiple sclerosis.

  • Discovery on Target 2011, being held Nov. 2-4 at the Park Plaza Hotel & Towers in Boston. Dr. Glick will give a presentation titled “Autoimmune Disease Modulation through Mitochondrial Bioenergetics” at 8:50 a.m. on Thursday, Nov. 3.

In this presentation, Dr. Glick will discuss how modulation of the mitochondrial ATPase can provide a selective, non-immunosuppressive approach to the treatment of inflammation and autoimmune disease. He will also describe the discovery of a novel series of orally available compounds that modulate the ATPase and exhibit therapeutic efficacy in murine disease models.

About Autoimmune Diseases

Serious autoimmune diseases are a major and growing public health problem. An autoimmune disorder is a condition that occurs when the immune system mistakenly attacks and destroys healthy body tissue. There are more than 80 different types of autoimmune disorders1, and approximately 50 million Americans, or one in five people, suffer from autoimmune diseases2.

About Lycera

Lycera Corp. is focused on the discovery and development of selective, small-molecule immunomodulators for the treatment of patients with autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis and inflammatory bowel disease. Lycera is developing drug candidates that target two novel therapeutic pathways and have the potential for first-in-class oral efficacy without the adverse effects of current standard-of-care antiproliferative and immunosuppressive agents. Lycera is focused on the emerging area of cellular bioenergetics to selectively target and silence pathologically activated cells. The company also has a program targeting the Th17 pathway through the inhibition of RORγt. Lycera’s leadership team and advisors represent the core thought leaders in immunology, inflammation, organ transplantation and kinase biology and are responsible for key advances and discoveries in these fields. Visit www.lycera.com for more information.

1 Medline Plus, http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000816.htm.

2 American Autoimmune Related Diseases Association, http://www.aarda.org/q_and_a.php.



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