ERX-41 shows activity in rare aggressive Breast Cancer subtype

San Antonio, TX – March 23, 2026.

We are pleased to present our new open-access paper in Biomolecules (link here).

Our paper shows activity of ERX-41 in Inflammatory breast cancer (IBC), a rare (2–4%) extremely aggressive subset of breast cancer, marked by rapid onset, early metastasis, and dismal 5-year survival (~40%) despite multimodal therapy.

Key findings:
•  ERX-41 blocks clonogenicity/invasion, induces apoptosis in IBC cells (SUM149, KPL4).
•  Rapid UPR activation: XBP1 splicing in 3–6 h, PERK/eIF2α/ATF4/CHOP induction, ER dilation.
•  LIPA KD/KO abolishes effects → on-target.
•  KPL4 xenografts: strong tumor suppression, ↓Ki-67, ↑GRP78.

LIPA emerges as novel vulnerability in this hard-to-treat disease. “These data validate our findings in our Nature Cancer paper showing activity of ERX-41 in multiple cancers, including hard to treat subsets!”, said Dr Ganesh Raj, CMO of Etira.

Histologic picture from ACS journal article titled Inflammatory Breast Cancer: The Disease, the Biology, the Treatment https://acsjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.3322/caac.20082