Tonix Pharmaceuticals announced that researchers at the University of Washington have initiated a placebo-controlled Phase 2 trial of Tonix’s TNX-1900 potentiated intranasal oxytocin for social anxiety disorder (SAD). The company said that the study is expected to enroll 50 subjects with diagnosed SAD and 50 matched healthy subjects. Researchers will evaluate how a single dose of TNX-1900 affects vicarious extinction learning, where an anxious person may have fears reduced by watching someone else demonstrate that an action is safe.
Tonix has also recently initiated Phase 2 studies of TNX-1900 for the treatment of migraine and for the treatment of obesity in pediatric patients.
Prinicple investigator Angela Fang, Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Washington said, “For psychiatric disorders characterized by severe social avoidance, such as social anxiety disorder, social learning has been disproportionately understudied despite its role in the acquisition of fear in models of anxiety. Social anxiety disorder is a disabling psychiatric disorder. Past research has focused on the observational, or vicarious, acquisition of fears, but little is known about how social information such as observing others experiencing safety can promote safety learning. To address this issue, we will study the effects of vicarious extinction learning on the recovery of conditioned fear.”
Tonix CEO Seth Lederman commented, “We are excited to collaborate with the University of Washington and Dr. Fang on the development of TNX-1900 for social anxiety disorder. In the past decade, there has been an increase in studies examining oxytocin’s effects on social cognition and behavior in animals and humans due to translational discoveries showing that intranasal oxytocin appears to reach central nervous system targets. Specifically, evidence suggests that oxytocin may enhance the importance of social cues or have anti-anxiety properties. These studies have shown that intranasal oxytocin may hold therapeutic promise for psychiatric disorders involving social deficits.”
Read the Tonix Pharmaceuticals press release.
