The early stage of hepatocellular carinoma (HCC) tumors (<5cm) can either be excised surgically, or removed by
ablation therapy, but treatment of advanced stage HCC remain challegning. Since, HCC and other liver cancers
are diagnosed at advanced stage, their surgical excision is not feasible. The existing front- and second-line
therapies for advanced hepatocellular carinoma include sorafenib (Nexavar) and cabozantinib (Cabometyx),
respectively. However these drugs can extend median overall survival of HCC patients up to only 3 months.
These facts underscore the most important unmet need, which is to improve the outcome of these drugs or by
developing more efficacious and less toxic therapies for HCC patients.
We have developed a novel approach, which is showing high efficacy in multiple HCC and Hepatoblastoma (HB)
cell lines. Specifically, our technology harnesses the potential of “cellular stress”, an inherent feature of many
cancers including liver and leukemias. Tumor cells typically undergo higher cellular stress than normal cells due to
exposure to intrinsic and external factors. We believe that mild induction of cellular stress to non-toxic levels, may
make cancer cells sensitive to novel drug candidate(s), and this unique combination will effectively kill tumors
than the any of the single agent alone.