Data provides first demonstration of glucose lowering and weight loss potency from pancreas-produced native human GLP-1, highlighting the capacity of pancreatic GLP-1 to provide metabolic control.

The human GLP-1 transgene sequence used in RJVA-001 was administered to eight-week-old db/db mice with established disease and resulted in up to 50% blood sugar lowering and 11% weight loss vs vehicle at four weeks after a single administration, compared to 32% glucose lowering and 2% weight loss vs vehicle with chronic semaglutide.

These results with a native, short half-life human GLP-1 sequence to be used in RJVA-001 build upon earlier results with a prototype transgene GLP-1 analogue.

Fractyl Health, Inc. (Nasdaq: GUTS) (the “Company”), a metabolic therapeutics company focused on pioneering new approaches for the treatment of obesity and type 2 diabetes (T2D), today announced promising new preclinical findings for the first clinical candidate in its Rejuva^® pancreatic gene therapy platform. RJVA-001 is the Company’s first GLP-1 gene therapy candidate to emerge from the platform, setting the stage for a potentially transformative approach to treating metabolic diseases, including obesity and T2D.

“As we advance our Rejuva program through preclinical development, we now observe that a single-dose administration of a human GLP-1 transgene (as in RJVA-001) can achieve durable lowering of blood sugar and body weight compared to vehicle or chronic semaglutide administration in the well-validated db/db mouse model of diabetes,” said Dr. Timothy Kieffer, Fractyl Health Chief Scientific Officer. “With these data, we are one step closer to IND enablement for RJVA-001 as part of our broader preclinical development package.”

These results show that the human GLP-1 coding sequence of RJVA-001 demonstrates potency on both glucose lowering and weight loss in db/db mice, the standard rodent T2D efficacy model used for clinical development. The Company has reached alignment with European regulators on the use of this efficacy model to support the submission of a Clinical Trial Application (CTA) in Europe.

“While there are clear benefits of GLP-1 for weight loss, glucose control, and metabolic health in general, there remains a need for advances in care that can offer a major step forward in GLP-1 therapy,” said Dr. Harith Rajagopalan, CEO of Fractyl Health. “Our goal with RJVA-001 is to change the trajectory of both obesity and T2D with a single administration therapy that offers the potential for the durable remission of metabolic disease.”

Fractyl Health anticipates progressing RJVA-001 through IND-enabling toxicity studies in 2024 and initiating First-in-Human clinical studies in the first half of 2025.