Our Science

Larkspur’s small molecules target cancer fitness genes to alter the state of cancer cells, enhancing cell death by steady state mechanisms.

Cancer fitness genes are genes that create a survival advantage for malignant cells. Larkspur’s small molecules target these gene products to make cancer cells more susceptible to competition and physiological cell death and killing mechanisms.

LarkX, our proprietary machine-learning-enabled gene signature platform, identifies pathways with cancer cell-intrinsic adaptations that drive immune evasion.

This identifies novel targets that mediate pathological cell-to-cell communication.

Larkspur’s clinical development focuses on biomarker-driven cancer patient cohorts to achieve early proof-of-concept.

Our first-in-class pipeline programs are initially focused on colorectal cancer (CRC), with opportunities to expand to multiple cancers.

Target Validation

Lead Discovery

Lead Optimization

Ind-Enabling

LRK-A

First-in-class PIP4K2C protein degrader; PIP4K2C has been shown to be a cancer-intrinsic driver of immune evasion in both tumor and immune cells

Pin1 Program

Novel therapy targeting Pin1 to modulate fibroblasts to drive a pro-immune phenotype in the tumor microenvironment

TIM-1 Program

The TIM-1 target is now being pursued as part of a Larkspur Biosciences / Alloy Therapeutics joint venture, Tiburon Therapeutics