Estrogen has many positive effects in postmenopausal women but is also associated with side effects which limit its use.

New Clinical Opportunities Through ERbeta Discovery
The discovery of the ERbeta receptor has created a number of new clinical opportunities since ERbeta selective agonists may not induce the side effects mediated by the ERalpha receptor. Typical ERalpha mediated side effects are proliferative responses that represent a risk for development of cancer in various tissues such as the uterus. These types of side effects should be avoided by targeting the ERbeta receptor and preclinical evidence suggest that ERbeta agonists, in addition to the opportunities within women’s health, can be useful for treatment of various cancers as well as inflammatory and CNS disorders.

Need for new Anti-Depressive Drugs
Karo Bio also continues to explore alternative clinical opportunities for
ERbeta compounds.

Preclinical data suggest that ERbeta compounds have a potential in future treatment of depression. Depression is a major health problem and affects women more often than men. In the US there are about 20 million patients that suffer from clinical depression and WHO predicts that by 2020 depression will be the second-largest cause of the global health burden. A significant part of the patients do not respond to current therapies or experience side effects such as sexual dysfunction, emotional numbing, insomnia and weight gain.