Oral STAT3 Inhibitor, TTI-101, in Patients with Advanced Cancers

Many patients have cancers that have increased activity of a protein called STAT3 that contributes critically to the development and growth of their cancer. Despite our knowledge of STAT3's importance to cancer, scientists and doctors have not developed a drug that targets it and that patients can take to treat their cancer more effectively than treatments that are now available. Tvardi Therapeutics, Incorporated has developed a compound, TTI-101, which can be given by mouth and acts as a direct inhibitor of STAT3. Administration of TTI-101 to mice demonstrated that it blocked growth of cancers of the breast, head and neck, lung, and liver and it was safe when administered at high doses to mice, rats, and dogs. In this application, Tvardi is proposing to further develop TTI-101 for treatment of solid tumors for which the prognosis is dismal. The investigators will determine how safe it is when administered to patients with cancer, determine whether an adequate dose can be administered to patients with cancer that will block STAT3 in their cancer, and determine whether treatment with TTI-101 leads to reduced growth of their cancer.

Signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT3) is a member of a family of seven closely related proteins responsible for transmission of peptide hormone signals from the extracellular surface of cells to the nucleus. STAT3 is a master regulator of most key hallmarks and enablers of cancer, including cell proliferation, resistance to apoptosis, metastasis, immune evasion, tumor angiogenesis, epithelial mesenchymal transition (EMT), response to DNA damage, and the Warburg effect. STAT3 also is a key mediator of oncogene addiction and supports the self-renewal of tumor-initiating cancer stem cells that contribute to cancer initiation, cancer maintenance, and relapse in several types of tumors. STAT3 activity is increased in \~50% of all cancers, due either to naturally occurring STAT3 mutations, as have been demonstrated in human inflammatory hepatocellular adenomas and large granular lymphocytic leukemia, or, more commonly as a result of activation of signaling molecules upstream of STAT3, including receptor tyrosine kinases (RTK; e.g. epidermal growth factor receptor, EGFR), tyrosine kinase-associated receptors (e.g. the family of IL-6 cytokine receptors or G-protein coupled receptors, GPCR), and Src kinases (e.g. Src, Lck, Hck, Lyn, Fyn, or Fgr). Thus, STAT3 is an attractive target for drug development to treat many types of cancer including breast cancer, head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC), non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), colorectal cancer (CRC), gastric adenocarcinoma and melanoma.