Singapore: Bionomics presented data on BNC375, its drug candidate for the treatment of memory loss in Alzheimer's disease, at the 33rd Annual Meeting of the Australian Neuroscience Society, in Melbourne, Australia. The event is being held from February 3-6, 2013, at the Melbourne Convention Center.

BNC375, which is a positive allosteric modulator of the a7 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (a7 nAChR), was the focus of poster number 143, exhibited on February 4, 2013, from 12.30 pm-to-2.30 pm. There is a large body of evidence implicating the α7 nAChR in the pathophysiology of several neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric diseases. Modulation of this receptor enhances cognitive processes, for example working memory and attention, which are compromised in these disorders.

The poster highlighted data demonstrating the in vivo memory enhancing properties of the drug candidate in two animal models of cognitive impairment as well as data on the action of BNC375 on the receptor. The animal model data indicates that BNC375 enhances both episodic memory and working memory and that it has equivalent performance as compared to Donepezil, a Pfizer product marketed as Aricept with $2.5 billion sales in 2011. BNC375 has a 100-fold therapeutic dose range, from 0.1-to-10 mg/kg and has demonstrated a wide therapeutic window in the preclinical studies conducted to date.

Dr Deborah Rathjen, CEO and MD, Bionomics, said that, "This latest drug candidate to come from our technology platform conforms to Bionomics' focus on developing well differentiated drug candidates to treat serious conditions such as Alzheimer's disease, Schizophrenia and Parkinson's disease amongst others."

According to Business Insights, in 2010 the estimated worldwide costs of dementia, including direct and indirect costs of care, was $604 billion with an estimated 35.6 million people worldwide affected by dementia. This is expected to double every 20 years reaching 65.7 million in 2030 and 115.4 million in 2050.