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Ouch, I just read that Reuters reported into the spat between SQM and Albemerle and the potential limiting of the water extraction. No wonder there's been a sentiment related buzz the last couple of days on lithium stocks

"The spat between Albemarle and SQM can be traced back to 2013, when government inspectors arrived at SQM’s installations and found something amiss.

Native Algarrobo trees - hardy desert hardwoods that survive by sending shoots deep into underground aquifers - were shedding their leaves and dying.

The 23 dead trees represented one-third of those SQM had committed to monitor. Like canaries in a coal mine, the health of the trees was meant to act as an early warning signal of water problems. Two years later, more trees were dying but SQM failed to notify authorities, according to government inspection reports"

Yes I will be pleased for the hydroxide numbers, glad to see the Czech's are back at work and it seems like Keith is busy and moving forward. With the new drilling numbers going in it would be nice to see a moderate re-rate, it is painful seeing the valuations of Aussie Lithium mines with fractions of our lithium having 20x the MCAP.

Have any tentative contract types been rumoured? It would be understandable if it went to Asia, but there may be politics to guiding us to remain in Europe, especially with Merkel's new state aid exemption to encouraging electric vehicles/lithium battery production.

https://global.handelsblatt.com/companies/eu-backs-german-plan-subsidize-e-car-battery-production-964949

My favourite quote:

"European manufacture of batteries is a goal close to the heart of Mr. Altmaier. He has convened a meeting of automakers, suppliers, chemical and energy companies for mid-November and hopes to announce consortium plans before the end of the year.

It will be a private sector consortium with no direct state participation, but there will be state aid. EU funds for research and development will also be available. In addition, structural funds for newer EU members like Poland could also be used to develop battery production in those countries."

A quite useful paper documenting the HSD10 protein and its link to cancers:

https://kuscholarworks.ku.edu/bitstream/handle/1808/21658/Carlson_ku_0099D_14562_DATA_1.pdf?sequence=1

Might help explain why a HSD10 inhibitor like VAL401 would be a useful drug.

HardToHandle, difficult to explain in laymans terms, I can do my best to summarise various science and key trial requirements.

VAL401 is a re-purposed licensed drug (risperidone + fatty acid), in lab tests and animal testing, it demonstrated efficacy at slowing the rate of cancerous growth (note: technically not cure). It works by inhibiting HSD10, HSD10 is a natural body process that gives cells energy and tells them to grow (and not die). Valirx have proved that VAL401 inhibits HSD10, and should slow down the cancer growth (prolonging life and reducing pain). HSD10 is overexpressed by a factor of 10x in certain cancer types - so bringing it back down to normal stops the runaway cell growth.

Valirx wanted to push straight into a Phase 3 trial, the regulator apparently suggested a short Phase 2 trial to validate that the VAL401 re-formulation was safe and did not throw out any unusual surprises, so a phase 2b trial was arranged.

In summary for the results, the key findings are

1) No patients exploded, a key requirement.
2) I believe they confirmed that the drug entered the body in the assumed manner, and they had signs that it may be working
3) 50% of patients reported a reduction in pain, interesting, because the pain is typically caused by the tumour tearing through natural flesh

Take home indicators: Vague potential demonstrations of efficacy, possible cleared path to full phase 3 trials, potential indications of increased life expectancy and pain reduction, modest initial data on PK drug behaviour in humans.

VAL401 could be a relatively cheap helping drug in the fight against cancer, or it may join a hundred other failed cancer drug efforts. I personally suspect it may have a modest efficacy in certain patients - it will probably be useless in other types (for example sex-hormone driven cancers).

Christ, Lithium Werks putting a £1.6bn battery factory in place, saying 500GWh output by 2030.

We know the clinical trial length is "18-26 weeks" about ~5.5 months from the .gov.uk site. If the trial is due to complete in June 2018, that suggests that we are dosing the final cohort at the final dosing rate?

"ValiRx Plc’s (LON:VAL) VAL201 prostate cancer drug has entered the final stages of its phase I/II clinical trial.

Last December, UK regulators gave the biotech permission to up the dose it gave to patients after early feedback showed the drug was safe and well-tolerated.

READ: ValiRx given green light to accelerate progress of prostate cancer drug
The current cohort of patients has now all received the escalated dose, meaning VAL201 is now on the home stretch of the study, although University College London Hospital continues to recruit patients to complete the trial."

Thanks for the reminder nomlungu, the targeted anti cancer therapies poster documents 11 patients dosed, the file attributes suggest the poster was created in Aug 2017, but I imagine the dataset is probably from early 2017. I'd estimate the 11th patient started dosing in January 2017 (based on the 4.5month dosing period and allowing a few months to document the results for the poster).

John, good to see you again, can I clarify why you say "think"? Are you basing that on indications we have been testing for a few months?

I'm a bit unclear how long they have been dosing since the trial ended last December.

The cancer segments are very interesting over the last 5 years.

I find SCLPs products should have a good use in melanoma, I was wondering if any regulars had opinions on where the market and NHS will go over the next few years?

I think CAR-Ts therapies will have a place, while I believe HIFU probably has a strong role to play in early to mid stage therapy. I wondered if anyone had any comments on what type of cancers SCLP will be involved in, what/when HIFU and CAR-Ts will move into?

Yes I believe the original trial plan was up to 5mg/kg, but I seem to recall in early 2018 approval was given by the authorities for an 8/16mg dosing increase. Assuming a 3 cohort would that be 8/12/16? or 5/8/16mg?

I cannot seem to find the RNS about this - was it in a presentation?

Shirley, signs of activity was a 40% reduction in tumour size last time data came out (iirc).

Dear god, we're finally in the last leg of the 201 trial...has been a long time but I am so excited about 201.

Still interested to see if valirx or a partner would expand into phase 2 breast/endo/ovarian.

High five Freddie :)

Freddie/Thoth...you have me chuckling away to my computer, great work

Untreated stage 4 lung cancer has a typical survival time of 2-4 months apparently

John, do you have a link to the petri dish testing?

I recall in the Valiseek patents it refers to testing where prostate and lung cancer (adenocarcinoma types) tumour growth was reduced by 50-70% in live mouse models.

Hi Soley, about right, sounds like the clinic was a bit erratic as well to me.

From the original theory, I was not expecting tumour shrinkage, the petri dish samples suggested it would prevent ~60% of NSCLC tumours from growing faster (due to managing high HSD10-related growth signal pathways), I don't think there was any suggestion it would cure the root genetic cause.

Some interesting comments on imaging data, only 2 are detailed but both showed stable disease.

Blimey, there's a whole heap of trial data on that link now, cheers Bermuda

Even includes pain relief, which suggests 50% of patients reported a reduction in pain. This would make sense, if the drug is effectively preventing tumour growth.