First Results of Avicidin Trials

SEATTLE--NeoRx Corporation reports that in phase I/II dose escalationstudies, Avicidin produced a 10-fold improvement in tumor-to-bloodratios over conventional radioimmunotherapy, approaching the ratiosachieved in animal studies.

Avicidin, a monoclonal antibody/yttrium-90 product, employs NeoRx'sproprietary pretargeting technology in which the radionuclideand antibody are injected separately rather than linked together.The radionuclide either attaches to the antibody that is pretargetedto the tumor or quickly exits the body, reducing radiation exposureto normal tissues, NeoRx said.