Muna Therapeutics to collaborate with GSK to identify new drug targets for Alzheimer's disease

The companies will explore insights from Muna's MiND-MAP platform, which applies spatial transcriptomics to brain samples from Alzheimer's disease patients, cognitively resilient individuals, healthy controls, and centenarians with and without cognitive impairment. This unique dataset of exceptional breadth and resolution will fuel the discovery and development of innovative medicines for Alzheimer's disease. Together, Muna and GSK will assess postmortem human brain samples with spatial transcriptomics and other approaches to identify and validate potential new drug targets. The collaboration leverages Muna's deep expertise in mapping the brain's response to pathological protein aggregates and its all-in-human platform to identify cellular mechanisms, gene networks, and molecular interactions that underlie brain resilience. Candidate drug targets will be validated using Muna's suite of humanized cell and animal models, supported by insights from patient tissue and biofluid samples.Under the terms of the agreement, Muna will receive an upfront payment from GSK of €33.5 million. In addition, Muna will be eligible to receive up to €140 million per target in milestone payments, as well as tiered royalties on net sales of products. Muna will expand and enhance its existing MiND-MAP dataset and will lead the identification and validation of new Alzheimer's disease targets. GSK will lead drug development and be responsible for preclinical activities, clinical development, manufacturing, and commercialization resulting from work on targets discovered and validated in the collaboration.