"Developing Therapies Based on Plant Glycosides of Vitamin D"
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Glycomyr

Glycomyr is a joint venture owned by Jesse Goff and Ronald Horst based in Ames, IA.

Glycomyr is developing products based on vitamin D to treat and prevent a number of human and animal diseases. The Wean-D line of products is designed to help the neonatal pig. The Wean-D+E product helps maintain normal bone and heart muscle development in baby pigs. We have now been able to develop Wean-D+E with Aspirin, to provide analgesia to the piglet at processing. Much of our research focus is aimed at using vitamin D compounds to prevent human diseases. The basis for these products is a plant that contains a number of vitamin D-related compounds that have been shown to have unique activities affecting both calcium metabolism and cell growth. These plant compounds are glycosides of the hormonal form of vitamin D, known as 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D and its precursor, 25-hydroxyvitamin D. Glycomyr has made progress in isolating these compounds and has tested crude preparations in both animal productions systems and in cell culture. Glycomyr has also succeeded in synthesizing pure and stable forms of these compounds for investigational use. Glycomyr's competitive strength, at this point, is that we have identified a raw plant material with robust bioactivity and synthesized analogs of those compounds that can be developed for a variety of applications and products as follows:

Use Vitamin D compounds to improve animal and human health.

  1. Incorporating plant leaves or extracts of the leaves into animal diets to improve animal health or productivity. > We have already conducted studies which demonstrate adding the plant leaves to the diet of laying hens increases eggshell thickness and improves bone strength and phosphorus utilization in broiler birds.

  2. Test glycosides of 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D for anti-cancer activity. These will be developed as primary or adjunct therapies for neoplastic tumors in patients with cancer. > We have already shown that one such glycoside of 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D has the ability to slow growth of cancer cells in tissue culture. We have also been able to slow growth of syngeneic mouse mammary gland tumors using this compound.

  3. Identify and/or isolate glycosides of 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D with the ability to activate bactericidal mechanisms within immune cells. These compounds will be developed as primary or adjunct agents to induce immune cell activation for treatment of granulomatous infections, such as tuberculosis, and to fight infections localized to particular areas of the gut and other organs.

  4. Develop methods to convert 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D glycosides in plant extracts to free 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D for sale into the pharmaceutical industry.

  5. Utilize glycosides of vitamin D to improve colon health. > We have been able to reduce symptoms of inflammatory bowel disease in a mouse model of Crohn’s disease with one of the synthesized glycosides of 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D.