Kura Oncology reports preclinical data on ziftomenib

Kura Oncology (KURA) reported preclinical data supporting the development of the Company’s menin inhibitor, ziftomenib, for the treatment of advanced gastrointestinal stromal tumors, GIST. The new findings are being presented at the 36th EORTC-NCI-AACR Symposium on Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics in Barcelona. The combination of ziftomenib and imatinib unexpectedly showed robust and durable antitumor activity in both imatinib-sensitive and imatinib-resistant GIST patient-derived xenograft models, and in all cases was significantly superior to imatinib monotherapy. Mechanistically, the data reveal a KIT-dependent mechanism, with ziftomenib and imatinib combining to sharply reduce KIT expression and/or activity, effectively silencing both the ERK and AKT/mTOR signaling pathways and driving robust cell cycle arrest and apoptosis.