Swansea University researchers say the antidiabetic drug canagliflozin could be repurposed to treat autoimmune diseases by modulating T-cell activation. This provides a more rapid route to clinical application with an already established safety profile.
A study conducted by Swansea University scientists has found that canagliflozin, a drug commonly used to treat type 2 diabetes, has potential applications in treating autoimmune diseases.
A study conducted by the University’s School of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences showed that canagliflozin (also known as Imvocana) could be effectively used to treat autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and systemic lupus erythematosus. This is because the drug targets T cells, an important part of the immune system.
Canagliflozin, a drug that controls blood sugar levels in people with type 2 diabetes, has discovered an unexpected role involving the human immune system.
Existing studies report that targeting T cell metabolism in autoimmunity may lead to therapeutic effects. T cells are a type of white blood cell that help the body fight infection and disease, but have been observed in autoimmune diseases to attack healthy tissue.
This new study was funded by the Medical Research Council and was recently published in a journal. cell metabolismfound that canagliflozin inhibited T-cell activation, suggesting that the drug could be repurposed as a treatment for T-cell-mediated autoimmunity.
Nick Jones, Ph.D., lead senior author of the study, said: “Our findings are important because they provide the basis for the clinical development of canagliflozin for the treatment of certain autoimmune diseases. The drug is already in widespread use and has a known safety profile in humans, which means it may reach the clinic sooner than any new drug developed and provide more rapid and valuable benefits to patients with autoimmune diseases.”
Swansea lead author and postdoc Ben Jenkins said: “Identifying novel roles for agents currently used in other disease settings is an interesting area of research. As our research primarily targets immune cell metabolism, we hope that the potential therapeutic benefits of our findings can be applied across a wide range of indications.”
Researchers hope that canagliflozin will enter clinical trials to treat certain autoimmune diseases in the future.
Reference: “Canagliflozin impairs T-cell effector function via metabolic suppression in autoimmunity.” Benjamin J. Jenkins, Julianna Blagih, Fernando M. Ponce-Garcia, Mary Canavan, Nancy Gudgeon, Simon Eastham, David Hill, Megan M. Hanlon, Eric H. Ma, Emma L. Bishop, April Rees, James G. Cronin, Elizabeth C. Jury, Sa rah K. Dimeloe, Douglas J. Veale, Katherine A. Thornton, Karen H. Vooden, David K. Finley, Ursula Fearon, Gareth W. Jones, Nicholas Jones, 24 May 2023, cell metabolism.
DOI: 10.1016/j.cmet.2023.05.001
