In August 2020, Cersci Therapeutics was acquired by ACADIA Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:ACAD) - a somewhat larger small firm in the business of small molecule drugs for the treatment of central nervous system disorders. Founded in 2015 and still very small, CERSCI Therapeutics had been structured around developing the next generation of non-opioid pain therapeutics addressing directly the risk of death, overdose, addiction or serious side effects with prescription opioids -- outweighing the benefits in chronic, non-cancer conditions such as headache, fibromyalgia and chronic low back pain. The organizing principle of the Cersci approach had been to address the mechanisms that cause pain to become chronic and turn this into therapies of tomorrow for chronic pain patients. By viewing chronic pain as a disease of the nervous system that can be reversed with targeted therapies, the effort is to create disease modifying therapies for chronic pain with aview to permanently reversing chronic pain. CERSCI Therapeutics is developing potent adenosine monophosphate-activated protein kinase (AMPK) activators for the treatment and prevention of chronic pain: novel chemistry and innovative biological target. CT-044 is CerSci's lead clinical candidate currently in Phase I Safety and Tolerability Studies in human volunteers (Phase I).
