Addex Joins With NIAAA To Evaluate ADX71441 In Alcohol Use Disorder

(RTTNews) - Addex Therapeutics (ADDXF.PK), a biopharmaceutical company focused on small molecule allosteric modulators for central nervous system disorders, announced Wednesday that it is entering a collaboration with the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism or NIAAA, a component of the National Institutes of Health or NIH.

The collaboration aims to evaluate Addex drug candidate, ADX71441, a GABAB receptor positive allosteric modulator or PAM, in in a battery of preclinical models to study its potential as a treatment for alcohol use disorder.

Both clinical and pre-clinical data suggest that activation of GABAB receptors offers a unique therapeutic opportunity to address the needs of patients with alcohol use disorder by suppressing multiple alcohol-related behaviors, including intake, reward and motivation, and seeking behavior. GABAB receptor PAMs have a similar pharmacological profile to the orthosteric agonist, baclofen, while showing a more favorable tolerability profile.

Addex said it has published positive data with ADX71441 in two models of alcohol abuse in mice, the ethanol binge-like drinking, drinking-in-the-dark and a model of long-term, excessive drinking, intermittent access to alcohol.

Sonia Poli, CSO at Addex, said, "The evaluation of ADX71441 in additional preclinical models established in the laboratory of clinical and translational studies at NIAAA will provide Addex with invaluable information to guide the clinical development of ADX71441 in alcohol use disorders. This is our first collaboration with NIAAA and another example of our strategy to advance our pipeline through collaborations with cutting edge governmental research groups."