Nagoya City University, Chubu University, Daiichi Sankyo Company ltd. and Mitsubishi UFJ Capital Co. Ltd. announced that they will commence open innovation research on a new cancer hyperthermia therapy.

Based on results of joint research under TaNeDS an open competition joint discovery research grant programme operated by Daiichi Sankyo.

The research aims to find and optimize magnetic nanoparticles with high capacity for delivery into tumours, and then study their practical application as a new hyperthermia therapy for cancer treatment by researching an alternating magnetic field generating device for efficiently heating the particles.

New company, OiDE RYO-UN Inc. has been established to carry out the research, and will be wholly funded by the OiDE Fund Investment Limited Partnership (OiDE Fund) operated by Mitsubishi UFJ Capital.

If the pre-agreed goals of the three-year joint research are achieved, Daiichi Sankyo will purchase all of the stock of RYO-UN in order to continue research and development for the project on its own.

Then, at the time of achieving its own goals and after a successful product launch, Daiichi Sankyo will pay considerations to Nagoya City University and Chubu University in the form of royalties.

The research on a new cancer hyperthermia treatment is the third OiDE Fund investment, and Daiichi Sankyo and Mitsubishi UFJ Capital plan to continue to carry out open innovation projects to develop new drug discovery platforms using the OiDE Fund.

Cancer hyperthermia therapy makes use of the characteristic that cancer cells have weaker heat resistance than normal cells.

This therapy selectively kills cancer cells through heating and there are expectations that it can be combined with radiotherapy, chemotherapy and cancer immunotherapy.