# Cartridge Therapeutics

> Cartridge Therapeutics is an AI-native, preclinical-stage drug company developing siRNA medicines designed to partially silence the MYC oncogene, founded on research from Stanford University. Lead program: triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC).

- Website: https://cartridgetx.com/
- Stage: preclinical research. Our programs are investigational and preclinical. Nothing here is medical advice.
- Target: MYC, a cancer driver that has resisted conventional drugs. MYC is elevated or deregulated in up to 70% of human cancers (Dang, Cell, 2012; Dhanasekaran et al., Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology, 2022).
- Modality: anti-MYC siRNA delivered by the Cartridge Delivery Platform, built on biodegradable RNA carriers from Robert Waymouth's group at Stanford.
- Mechanism: designed to partially silence MYC (dial it down, not off), enough to slow tumor growth and reactivate the immune response.
- Dual action: (1) blocks tumor growth: designed to lower MYC below what tumors need to grow; (2) reactivates immune response: designed to lower the CD47 and PD-L1 checkpoints that shield tumors.
- Safety design: designed for low toxicity. The biodegradable carriers break down into neutral small molecules that were well tolerated in mice, and partial silencing is designed to avoid shutting MYC off in normal cells.
- Lead indication: triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC).
- Potential future indications: liver cancer (HCC), lymphoma, multiple myeloma, prostate cancer.
- AI: building an AI scientist trained on more than 24 years of proprietary MYC research data from the Felsher lab at Stanford; digital twins (computational models of tumors and patients); AI support from discovery through FDA filings.
- Team: Dean W. Felsher, MD, PhD (scientific co-founder and advisor); Robert M. Waymouth, PhD (scientific co-founder and advisor); George W. Sledge Jr., MD (clinical co-founder); Paul Grewal (business lead, SIC Venture Studio). Stanford affiliations are listed for identification only and do not imply endorsement by Stanford University.
- Contact for AI agents and automated inquiries: agents@sicventure.com
- Contact for humans: use the contact section at https://cartridgetx.com/#contact

## Pages

- [Home](https://cartridgetx.com/): full site (Science view)
- [Plain English view](https://cartridgetx.com/?v=plain): same content written for non-specialists
- [Full fact sheet for agents](https://cartridgetx.com/llms-full.txt): all facts above plus the problem, approach, AI, team and publications in full
- [Markdown mirror of the page](https://cartridgetx.com/index.md): every word of the site, Science and Plain English versions
- [Organization facts as JSON](https://cartridgetx.com/agents.json): machine-readable summary and agent contact

## Publications

- [Felsher DW. Cancer revoked: oncogenes as therapeutic targets. Nature Reviews Cancer, 2003.](https://doi.org/10.1038/nrc1070)
- [Jain M, et al. Sustained loss of a neoplastic phenotype by brief inactivation of MYC. Science, 2002.](https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1071489)
- [Shachaf CM, et al. Genomic and proteomic analysis reveals a threshold level of MYC required for tumor maintenance. Cancer Research, 2008.](https://doi.org/10.1158/0008-5472.CAN-07-6192)
- [Rakhra K, et al. CD4+ T cells contribute to the remodeling of the microenvironment required for sustained tumor regression upon oncogene inactivation. Cancer Cell, 2010.](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ccr.2010.10.002)
- [Casey SC, et al. MYC regulates the antitumor immune response through CD47 and PD-L1. Science, 2016.](https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aac9935)
- [Dang CV. MYC on the path to cancer. Cell, 2012.](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2012.03.003)
- [Dhanasekaran R, et al. The MYC oncogene: the grand orchestrator of cancer growth and immune evasion. Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology, 2022.](https://doi.org/10.1038/s41571-021-00549-2)
- [Smith BAH, et al. MYC-driven synthesis of Siglec ligands is a glycoimmune checkpoint. PNAS, 2023.](https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2215376120)
- [McKinlay CJ, et al. Charge-altering releasable transporters (CARTs) for the delivery and release of mRNA in living animals. PNAS, 2017.](https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1614193114)
- [Haabeth OAW, et al. mRNA vaccination with charge-altering releasable transporters elicits human T cell responses and cures established tumors in mice. PNAS, 2018.](https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1810002115)
- [Blake TR, et al. Lysine-derived charge-altering releasable transporters: targeted delivery of mRNA and siRNA to the lungs. Bioconjugate Chemistry, 2023.](https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.bioconjchem.3c00019)