Novel procedure for cell delivery in Rinri Therapeutics’ first clinical trial described in peer-reviewed publication
Sheffield, UK, 11 November 2024 – Rinri Therapeutics, which is focused on transforming hearing loss treatment with regenerative cell therapy, announces that the novel surgical procedure to be used for regenerative cell delivery in its first-in-human trial has been published in the prestigious journal Nature Scientific Reports.
This paper, ‘A novel therapeutic pathway to the human cochlear nerve’1 describes the development of a safe, effective, and minimally invasive procedure for the direct delivery of therapeutics to the nerve that connects the inner ear to the brain, in order to restore neural forms of hearing loss. The technique will be used in the first-in-human trial for Rincell-1, the company’s lead first-in-class product for hearing loss, which is expected to start next year.
The loss of nerve connections in the inner ear is the key cause of highly prevalent hearing conditions such as age-related hearing loss (presbycusis) and auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder (ANSD), which together affect over 100 million people worldwide. Using a cell therapy to regenerate nerve cells within the inner ear holds great potential to improve hearing and quality of life for those affected.
However, the nerve connections within the inner ear are located deep within the skull and, until now, have only been accessible via extremely invasive surgery. Funded by Rinri Therapeutics, researchers from the universities of Nottingham and Sheffield, King’s College London, Canada and Sweden, have now discovered a new safe and reliable way to access these nerves through the inner ear’s round window2 – a much less invasive and more accessible approach.
Rinri Therapeutics’ lead product, Rincell-1, is designed to address neural forms of hearing loss by regenerating nerve connections between the inner ear and the brain. It provides a novel disease-modifying treatment for patients with severe-to-profound age-related hearing loss and ANSD.
Rincell-1 was developed using the pioneering OSPREY™ platform for generating allogeneic “off-the-shelf” regenerative cell therapies for neural hearing loss. Now, having rapidly achieved outstanding preclinical safety and efficacy data with a clinical-grade product, Rincell-1 is expected to start first-in-human proof-of-concept trials in 2025.
Dr Simon Chandler, CEO of Rinri Therapeutics, said:
The novel access route developed in elegant work by this team of leading hearing loss researchers and surgeons makes the delivery of transformative cell therapies like Rincell-1 possible. We’re delighted that the first-in-human trial for our lead product is on track to start in 2025, bringing the potential to transform the lives of people with neural hearing loss.
Professor Doug Hartley, University of Nottingham, Chief Medical Officer at Rinri Therapeutics said: ‘Neural hearing loss has a significantly detrimental effect on the ability to understand speech, particularly with background noise, with a significant detrimental impact on quality of life. The novel surgical access devised by this research collaboration provides a therapeutic pathway to the cochlear nerve which is expected to be highly valuable in clinical practice as part of regenerative cell therapy for this global unmet medical need.’
1 Li, H., Agrawal, S., Zhu, N. et al. A novel therapeutic pathway to the human cochlear nerve. Sci Rep 14, 26795 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-74661-5
2 The round window is a partition between the middle and inner ear.
For further information please contact: Dr Simon Chandler, CEO [email protected]
