2017 has been good so far for ProMIS Neurosciences (TSX:PMN), continuing to build upon what the last seven months of 2016 started. At the end of May 2016, shares of PMN had sunk as low as 4 cents each before reversing course at the start of June to hit a 2016-high of 24 cents that month, followed by a high of 35 cents earlier this month.
After retracing a bit from the high to a low of 26 cents yesterday, shares are back on the climb Wednesday morning on news that the company designating its second lead product for development in Alzheimer's disease. ProMIS now intends to develop the monoclonal antibody PMN350, which acts by targeting toxic prion-like forms of amyloid-beta oligomers, or AbetaO for short, to treat the difficult neurodegenerative disease.
PMN350 follows PMN310, the company's first product for Alzheimer's that has been shown to to selectively bond to amyloid-beta oligomers to slow propagation and neurotoxicity. In vitro and in vivo lab tests have demonstrated that PMN350 bonds with a different epitope on AbetaO.
While there is still somewhat limited information on AbetaO, the aggregates of amyloid beta protein have been garnering attention in scientific circles in recent years as a prime target for novel Alzheimer's therapies. ProMIS identified PMN350 as a new candidate for development following testing by contract research organization SynAging, SAS that showed promising results in mouse models of Alzheimer's.
As the morning session winds down, shares of PMN are trading ahead 3 cents from Tuesday's close, or 8.9%, at 31 cents.
