LifePharms Inc. Natural Product Collection.

NATURAL PRODUCTS
Successes

Why natural products ?

Natural products have consistently been the most successful source of natural product drug leads. Between 1983 and 1994, 39% of antibacterials and anticancer drugs were derived from natural products. Also, in that same time period, 39% of all new approved drugs were from either natural products or derived from natural products.

Why are LifePharms’ collections good sources for drugs?

Basidiomycetes and ascomycetes have evolved over several hundreds of millions of years to develop biological responses to survive and protect themselves from attack from fungi, bacteria, and animals. Every single extract in LifePharms’ collection contain 100% biologically active compounds that target prokaryotic or eukaryotic organisms. Much of the history of drug discovery is replete with examples of fungus derived agents, including cholesterol lowering agents, cyclosporine, and most antibacterials.
Many of these compounds, particularly in the nonpolar library, are small molecules with drug-like properties. Thus, they very likely can be absorbed and metabolized by the body. LifePharms’ compounds can be a very economical way to gain chemical diversity. Since many of these compounds will have oral availability, the costs of converting them into drugs will be lower than for synthetic compounds

The chemical novelty associated with natural products is higher than that of any other source. This novelty is very important when looking for lead molecules or chemical scaffolds. Structures from our fungus collection will possess much of the chemical complex space needed in drug development.

The novelty of LifePharms’ collection is enormous. Never has this collection of North American mushrooms ever been looked at systemically for drug discovery purposes. Every single collaboration LifePharms has pursued has resulted in the discovery of lead compounds with interesting biological activities. LifePharms’ lead cancer compound is further proof of the novelty of the chemical structures yet to be found in the collection. The lead compound has a novel structure as well as unique biological activities.

LifePharms’ hit rate greatly exceeds the hit rate with synthetic libraries or extracts of cultured organisms. The industry standard is that for every 100,000 to 300,000 samples, there will be an average of 100 to 300 hits. LifePharms’ average hit rate in its previous screens has been two orders of magnitude greater.