ABOUT CQDM Since its inception, CQDM has raised more than $275 million to fund the development of 150 + drugs addressing major health challenges, including cancer, neurodegenerative and metabolic diseases. CQDM is a biopharmaceutical research consortium whose mission is to fund the development of innovative tools and technologies that accelerate the development of safe and…
Challenge: Human cells eliminate non-functional proteins using a sophisticated degradation pathway named the ubiquitin proteasome system (UPS), in which UPS enzymes attach a small protein called ubiquitin to damaged target proteins to tag them for degradation. However, abnormalities in protein degradation are frequently observed in many diseases, including cancer where aberrant control of protein degradation…
Challenge: The sensory neuron damage referred as “Chemotherapy-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy” (CIPN) affects 30-40% of cancer patients in Canada. Sensory neurons transmit information from the brain to every other part of the body allowing movement and awareness of our environment. The deterioration of these cells from chemotherapy causes severe pain often leading to the interruption of…
Challenge: Nuclear receptors (NRs) are a family of proteins that regulate gene expression in many vital processes such as metabolism, growth and behaviour. They are also implicated in a large array of diseases such as diabetes, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and cancer. Consequently, nuclear receptors represent one of the most important class of targets for existing drugs.…
Challenge: A major problem with protein-based therapeutics is their immunogenicity, i.e. their tendency to trigger an unwanted immune response against themselves. This leads to the activation of immune cells and secretion of anti-drug antibodies (ADA) that may contribute to an inactivation of the biologics and cause adverse clinical events. Therefore, there is a need in…
Challenge: Silencing RNAs (siRNAs) are small nucleic acids that can inhibit virtually any gene. Because most diseases could benefit from shutting-down the action of a specific protein encoded by its gene, it is suggested that siRNAs could be used to treat virtually any diseases. However, naked siRNA is unstable in the bloodstream and cannot efficiently…
Challenge: The popularity of therapeutic proteins has recently increased mostly due to their broad applicability, but the druggable space for biologics is still restricted to extracellular targets. Indeed, the number of potential targets either secreted or with extracellular domains represents only one-third of the proteome, thus significantly restricting attainable pathways. In parallel, intracellular delivery methods…
Challenge: Retinal degenerative diseases, such as age-related macular degeneration and glaucoma, are the leading causes of vision loss and affect tens of millions of individuals in the world. Emerging solutions with nucleic acids and therapeutic genes show promise. However, there remains a void in effective and non-invasive drug delivery systems for the back of the…
Challenge: Of the top 10 most fatal illnesses in the world, Alzheimer’s disease is the only one for which there is currently no disease-modifying therapy available. Abnormal clusters of toxic amyloid protein fragments build up between nerve cells in the brain leading to impaired memory. The current therapies in development are biologics, antibodies and peptides…
Challenge: Many cancers are treated with cocktails of chemotherapeutic drugs designed to prevent growth and spread of cancerous cells. Chemotherapy damages healthy cells, causing undesired side effects such as myelosuppression and cardiotoxicity. Localized drug therapy, if appropriately delivered could have a major impact on quality of life and treatment efficacy. Solution : The lead investigator has…