New substance offers hope for a cure against multi-resistant bacteria

Antibiotic resistance is rising to dangerously high levels in all parts of the world. New resistance mechanisms are emerging and spreading globally, threatening our ability to treat common infectious diseases. A growing list of infections – such as pneumonia, tuberculosis, blood poisoning, gonorrhea, and foodborne diseases – are becoming harder, and sometimes impossible, to treat as antibiotics become less effective.

The EBL-1003 substance could, in the future, potentially be used to treat critically ill patients in hospital settings. EBL-1003 is a crystalline free base of an aminoglycoside designed to treat Gram-negative bacterial infections. EBL-1003 for infusion has demonstrated potent broad-spectrum activity and rapid bactericidal killing of Acinetobacter baumannii and other Gram-negative bacteria, including organisms identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as urgent and serious threats to human health.

"EBL-1003 has the potential to replace aminoglycosides currently used in the clinic, but whose utility is seriously threatened by rising antibiotic resistance", says Sven Hobbie, CEO at Juvabis. "We were able to make significant progress in the development of a new treatment thanks to our collaboration with RISE".

Test are showing positive results

The molecule that the injectable substance is based on is already in use in veterinary treatment, primarily outside of Europe and the United States. During phase 1, Juvabis collaborated with RISE to further develop the drug, which was subsequently tested on healthy volunteers with positive results.

"During this initial phase, we bought the original substance from the manufacturer and analyzed and refined it in our laboratory in Södertälje", says Bo Lassen, RISE's project manager who is also in charge of the formulation aspect of the project. "We've designed analytical methods and formulations, improved the solid state of the molecule to make it more stable for storage, and evaluated its toxicity and tolerability among other things".

EBL-1003 underwent phase 1 clinical trials as part of the European Gram-Negative Anti-Bacterial Engine (ENABLE), a project sponsored by the Innovative Medicines Initiative that completed in 2021, with another clinical trial sponsored by the National Institutes of Health currently in preparation.

More thorough research is now being conducted to advance the substance's development into a treatment that can be used in healthcare. Even though ENABLE ceased last year, Juvabis’s partnership with RISE continues, and a new funding application has been submitted to also develop the compound for inhalation.