Dr Ben-Tsion Williger, CancerTek Pharmaceuticals Ltd, ISRAEL

CancerTek Pharmaceuticals is a young, private biotechnology company with 5 employees, currently based in the Incentive Technology Incubator. It was founded by Dr Ben-Tsion Williger in May 2001 and is dedicated to the development of anti-cancer therapeutics based on targeting the pathway of MMP-9 synthesis. Previous attempts at inhibition of MMP synthesis are now considered to have failed, but CTP's approach is to target the phospholipase-D (PLD) enzyme that is critical in the synthetic pathway, and is not bypassed.

This proprietary discovery has now been validated in-vitro and in-vivo, and now CTP is currently engaged in screening for inhibitors of PLD, using a novel cellular assay that detects all inhibitors of MMPs. CTP is also investigating other pathways that are involved in the synthesis of other MMPs.

Activities in MetaBre:collection of tissue samples, gene profiling. mechanisms of MMP synthesis and screening of inhibitors.