JUDY NEWMAN
608-252-6156
March 9, 2007
Cellectar, a Madison biotech company developing a shot-in-the-arm treatment for cancer, is about to take a big leap forward, thanks to a healthy wad of cash, a one-of-a-kind machine and a new, well-credentialed chief executive with big hopes and plans.
Once in the bloodstream, Cellectar's drug identifies cancerous tumors, vividly lighting them up in a computer image. A second, more potent dose then shrinks the malignancies.
So far, the drug - known as CLTR-404 - has been shown to diagnose and treat 37 types of cancer, based on studies using mice, said Cellectar co-founder Jamey Weichert. It hunts for cancer cells, from the brain to the colon, ignoring benign tumors.
