Transforming the Treatment of Cancer, Metaplasia and Inflammatory Diseases
Our mission is to address significant unmet needs by combining disruptive innovation with disciplined execution
Our Vision
Enhance the lives of patients suffering from cancer, inflammation and other conditions by changing what’s possible in drug discovery.
Our Strategy
Discover and develop novel therapies to cure or alleviate cancer, metaplasia and inflammatory disease that selectively target the underlying cause.
Build a robust pipeline of preclinical and clinical assets alone and/or in partnership with established category leaders in cancer and inflammation.
At Tract Bio, we have a breakthrough stem cell discovery platform stemECHO that has enabled identification of druggable targets for potential therapies for inflammation metaplasia and cancer.
Unmet Need
Despite advances in the management of cancer and inflammatory diseases, current treatment approaches do not address the underlying cause of the disease and patients often develop resistance, resulting in poor prognosis.
Disease Associated Stem Cells
Disease-associated stem cells exhibit pro-inflammatory and pro-fibrotic features in respiratory and gastrointestinal diseases, provide a self-renewing source for tumor development, and serve as a target for therapeutic approaches that overcome treatment resistance.
StemECHO
Technology
StemECHO is a drug discovery platform that allows for reliable, high-volume generation of pure stem cell libraries in their ground-state while preserving the functional, genetic, and epigenetic integrity of the original stem cell. The StemECHO platform has identified disease-associated stem cells in cancer and inflammatory diseases.
TP-101 Program
TP-101 is a novel drug combination identified using StemECHO that targets a common mechanism among disease-associated stem cells in cancer and inflammation to enable efficacy potential across tumor heterogeneity and inflammatory disease.
Prior to the establishment of stemECHO, there was no practical way to isolate stem cells from tissue biopsies and expand them the hundreds of millions of times necessary for analysis or use in drug discovery assays.
In contrast, stemECHO allows us to isolate single stem cells from a biopsy and expand each of these individual stem cells separately hundreds of millions of times while preserving both the genetic and epigenetic characteristics of the original stem cell. With stemECHO, we can produce a population of diseased stem cells which is robust enough for effective drug discovery.
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StemECHO uniquely clones pathogenic disease-causing stem cells in cancer and inflammation resulting in identification of druggable targets
Current “Organoids” technology doesn’t allow for unlimited expansion with individual cell identification. In contrast, stemECHO enables the generation of pure stem cell “libraries.”
Scientific Team
Our Scientific Founders are pioneers in stem cell biology and disease pathogenesis of epithelial tissue. Their research has been widely published in peer reviewed top tier journals such as Cell and Nature.
Dr. Wa Xian, Ph.D.
Dr. Xian is an Associate Professor of Biology and Biochemistry at the University of Houston Stem Cell Center and is a CPRIT Scholar in Cancer Research.
Dr. Frank McKeon, Ph.D.
Dr. McKeon is a Professor in the Department of Biology and Biochemistry at the University of Houston and is the Director of Somatic Stem Cell Center at UH, as well as a CPRIT Established Investigator in Cancer Research. Frank was previously a Professor at Harvard Medical School for 23 years.
Dr. McKeon also serves as the Interim Chief Scientific Officer.
William Bachovchin, Ph.D.
Dr. Bachovchin is a Professor in the Department of Developmental, Molecular and Chemical Biology at Tufts University School of Medicine with extensive experience in drug discovery development. He has invented a range of drugs that have progressed into the clinic – including the anti-cancer drug Talabostat, and more recently, precision radiopharmaceutical and chemotherapeutic drugs. His patents also include the discovery of the role of DPPIV in diabetes, which were licensed to Merck for its Januvia drug (peak annual sales $4.5B).
Matt Vincent, Ph.D., J.D.
Dr. Vincent is a co-founder and contributes to Tract’s IP strategy and in-house scientific efforts. He is co-inventor across a portion of the portfolio of Tract.
Leadership & Board of Directors
Richard Russell is the Chief Executive Officer. Rick has more than 20 years of experience leading organizations both in the clinical and commercial stages. He currently serves as Executive Board Chairman for Windgap Medical and on the board of the South Shore Health and Hospital Foundation. He previously served as a member of the board of MassBio from 2012-2022.
John Noseworthy is a member of our board. He currently serves as a member of the Boards of Directors of UnitedHealth Group, Alix Partners and the Mitre Corporation. Previously he served as the president and CEO of the Mayo Clinic from 2009-2018, leading one of the largest not-for-profit, academic health systems in the US., with an excess of $12 billion in annual revenues and more than 60,000 employees. Prior to his appointment as CEO in 2009, Dr Noseworthy was chair of Mayo Clinic’s Department of Neurology, medical director of the Department of Development, vice chair of the Mayo Clinic Rochester Executive Board, and architect of the strategic plan to position Mayo for the future. Previously he served as a director at Merck & Co Inc. and as a health care governor of the World Economic Forum.
Robert Izard, J.D. is General Counsel. Bob is the former Chair of the ABA Litigation Section’s Commercial and Business Litigation Committee.
Charlie Izard is a member of our board. He joined Brown Brothers Harriman in 1995 and became a General Partner in 2004. Charlie has held several leadership roles at BBH including Co-Head of Investment and Wealth Management, Vice Chairman of BBH Trust Cos, President of BBH Mutual Funds and has served on the Firm’s Finance Committee.
Joseph Suarez is the Chief Financial Officer, and is experienced in leading strategy, business operations, finance, human resources and information technology.
Pipeline
We have created a robust development pipeline based on our unique discoveries and expect to have an IND submitted for Gastric Cancer in the next 24 months.
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We have identified 4 target areas for clinical development of our lead assets. The lead indication is in gastric cancer with TP-101. Our other programs are in ovarian, Barrett’s Esophagus and esophageal adenocarcinoma where we are finalizing drug candidate selections for each of these indications. We plan to begin the IND enabling studies on TP-101 for gastric cancer with the goal of gaining approval to begin clinical studies with 24 months.
Publications
Inflammatory Activity of Epithelial Stem Cell Variants from Cystic Fibrosis Lung Is Not Resolved by CFTR Modulators
American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, 2023
Cloning a profibrotic stem cell variant in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis
Science Translational Medicine, 2023
Cloning of ground-state intestinal stem cells from endoscopic biopsy samples
Nature Protocols, 2020
Cloning and variation of ground state intestinal stem cells
Nature, 2015
Mutational spectrum of Barrett’s stem cells suggests paths to initiation of a precancerous lesion
Nature Communications, 2015
p63+Krt5+ distal airway stem cells are essential for lung regeneration
Nature, 2015
Distal Airway Stem Cells Yield Alveoli In Vitro and during Lung Regeneration following H1N1 Influenza Infection
Cell, 2011
Residual Embryonic Cells as Precursors of a Barrett’s-like Metaplasia
Cell, 2011