Eikonizo: brain-penetrant HDAC inhibitors for neurodegeneration

Eikonizo aims to shore up axonal transport to treat neurodegenerative diseases, starting with ALS; and to de-risk its programs, the company is developing a companion PET tracer to confirm target engagement in vivo.
The company's lead program is an oral small molecule that penetrates the blood-brain barrier and inhibits HDAC6, which deacetylases tubulins, the protein building blocks of microtubules.

Microtubules transport proteins and other organelles down axons and across synapses. The acetylated form of tubulin is firm and has no gaps between each protein, said Eikonizo Therapeutics Inc. co-founder and CEO Janice Kranz, allowing the resulting microtubules to better transport their cellular cargo. ...