• The Need:
Polymer derivatives of the antimicrobial drugs can be used as additives to materials to create self-sterilizing surfaces and bactericidal products – paints, plastics, and textiles. The problem of drug resistant bacteria is no longer confined to hospitals, and can be found in many places in the community. There are numerous areas of need for antimicrobial compounds for which bacterial resistance is difficult to develop. These include:

• The News:
PolyMedix is developing antimicrobial polymers for use in medical devices, personal care products and for industrial applications. These polymers work via the same mechanism of action as the small molecules PolyMedix is developing for its anti-infective i.v. product candidate: they mimic the action of the host defense proteins. Because of this unique mechanism of action, we believe it will be very difficult for bacterial resistance to develop to our compounds.

• The Development Strategy:
The materials applications for PolyMedix compounds, such as PMX-50003 and PMX-70004, consist of paints and coatings, solid materials such as polyurethanes and other plastics, and textiles. The goal is to create surfaces and materials that are bactericidal and thereby free of bacteria and risk of infection. Compared with other approaches to impart antimicrobial properties to materials, PolyMedix's polymers offer a number of important and significant advantages:

• Lack of toxicity to mammalian cells - much safer than materials that release metal (e.g. silver) or chlorine ions, or non-specific quaternary detergent-like polymers.
• High potency
• Broad spectrum of activity - works against both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria, and has the potential for anti-fungal and anti-viral activity.

With the growing awareness of bacterial and viral infections, consumers may want products that will reduce their risk of microbial infection. Thus, the bactericidal polymers have the potential of forming the basis of a sizeable commercial enterprise with broad consumer product appeal. However, in order to not divert the Company from its primary mission of developing novel pharmaceutical products, PolyMedix will focus on generating basic data to facilitate out-licensing efforts.

• The Status:
PolyMedix has successfully incorporated our polymers into a wide variety of formulations and these formulations retain the antimicrobial properties we desire. Experiments include:

• Painting compounds onto a surface
• Mixing/incorporating compounds into a variety of plastics such as :
  • PVC
  • Polyurethane
  • PLGA (polylactic glycolic acid) polymer (used in sutures)
  • PLA (polyactic acid) polymer (used in biodegradable sutures)
  • Styrene plastic
  • Polysulfone plastic,
  • Polycapralactone plastic (polyester)
  • Silicone
• Coating a variety of surfaces with our compounds
• Covalently attaching our compounds to glass and metals

Antimicrobial applications in medical devices may be particularly attractive, both from the perspective of market opportunity as well as time and cost to develop. One especially attractive application may be for antimicrobial catheter tubing. Bacterial contamination of indwelling catheters, and resulting risk of infection, are a widely documented concern. The following images show the effects of incorporating 1% polymer into polyvinylchloride catheter tubing and subsequent exposure to bacteria, with results showing a complete antimicrobial effect:

PYMX Polymers Remain Active After Incorporation into Polymers Blends

Materials into which PolyMedix polymers have been successfully incorporated

• Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastic
• Polyurethane plastic
• PLGA (polylactic glycolic acid) polymer (used in sutures)
• PLA (polyactic acid) polymer (used in biodegradable sutures)
• Styrene plastic
• Polysulfone plastic
• Polycapralactone plastic (polyester)
• Silicone

Super Fast Killing Abilities of Copolymers Attached to Surfaces

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