AXIM Biotechnologies, Inc. announced that it has completed pre-clinical drug studies on its patent pending compound SPX-1009, demonstrating the suppression of malignant metastatic melanoma cells. The independent research was completed by Dr. Douglas Lake’s laboratory at Arizona State University. Melanoma is the most serious type of skin cancer because of its ability to spread to other organs rapidly if it is not treated at an early stage. According to SkinCancer.org, an estimated 207,390 cases of melanoma will be diagnosed in the U.S. in 2021 and an estimated 7,180 people will die of melanoma in the U.S. in 2021. SPX-1009 was first screened in a cell-free enzymatic assay for its ability to inhibit Quiescin Sulfhydryl Oxidase I (“QSOX1”), a tumor-derived enzyme that is important for cancer growth, invasion and metastasis, and was then tested for its ability to inhibit growth and invasion of a well-established A375 melanoma cell line and a low-passage patient-derived melanoma. 2D invasion assays and 3D tumor spheroid assays were employed to measure the effect of the compounds on tumor invasion. As a next step, AXIM intends to initiate animal studies to demonstrate the ability of SPX-1009 to suppress tumor growth and metastasis in a murine model of melanoma. AXIM’s intellectual property related to the SPX-1009 technology is the subject of numerous patent-pending applications.