$HEPA Hepion Pharma could be a mover Tuesday

EDISON, NJ / ACCESSWIRE / January 6, 2020 / Hepion Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (HEPA), a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of therapeutic drugs for the treatment of liver disease arising from non-alcoholic steatohepatitis ("NASH"), today announced that the peer-reviewed journal, Expert Opinion on Investigational Drugs, has published a paper entitled, "Cyclophilin inhibition as a potential treatment for nonalcoholic steatohepatitis." Cyclophilins are a family of modulatory enzymes and the target of Hepion's candidate drug, CRV431.

Authored by Hepion's Chief Scientific Officer, Dr. Daren Ure; Senior Vice President of Drug Development, Dr. Daniel Trepanier; Senior Vice President of Clinical Pharmacology, Dr. Patrick Mayo; and CEO, Dr. Robert Foster, the paper is a comprehensive review of studies that have investigated cyclophilins in NASH and NASH-related liver disease. The scientific literature provides abundant evidence that pharmacologic inhibition of cyclophilins with compounds such as Hepion's CRV431 could help to resolve multiple pathophysiological activities that occur in NASH, including mitochondrial dysfunction, liver cell death, inflammation, and most notably, fibrotic scarring of the liver. Targeting several disease processes together is considered the most effective way to treat NASH.

"We believe the invitation to submit this seminal publication recognizes our team's collective 100+ years of cyclophilin research and drug discovery, and the growing appreciation that this class of drug offers therapeutic opportunities that other NASH drug candidates do not," said Dr. Foster.

Lead author, Dr. Ure, further commented, "Decades of research, especially in other fields such as cardiology and neurology, have defined roles for cyclophilins in the most fundamental and universal of disease mechanisms. Applying that knowledge now to liver disease represents a novel and compelling approach in the development of new drug treatments for NASH."