Mr. Greg Fenton reports

ZENTEK PROVIDES UPDATE ON ~$1.1MILLION INNOVATIVE SOLUTIONS CANADA CONTRACT TO DEVELOP AN AVIAN INFLUENZA COUNTERMEASURE (H5N1) USING ITS MULTIVALENT APTAMER TECHNOLOGY

Zentek Ltd. has completed the first phase of the Innovative Solutions Canada testing stream contract by delivering a lead candidate countermeasure for highly pathogenic avian influenza A (H5N1) and has moved to the testing phase of the project.

Highlights:

• Zentek was awarded approximately $1.1-million through the government of Canada's Innovative Solutions Canada testing stream under Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada for health advanced and emerging medical technologies.
• Government of Canada testing partners include ISED's Health and Emergency Preparedness Canada and Defence Research and Development Canada, the science and technology organization of the Department of National Defence.
• The contract began in November, 2024, to develop both a prophylactic and therapeutic for avian influenza HPAI A (H5N1) using a multivalent aptamer strategy that previously led to the successful development of the SARS-CoV-2 aptamer.
• Most activities for the lead countermeasure candidate development were performed through collaboration with the Li Lab at McMaster University.

On Oct. 31, 2024, Zentek and the government of Canada signed an ISC testing stream contract to develop a prophylactic and therapeutic lead candidate countermeasure for HPAI A (H5N1). The countermeasure to be produced for the contract was to utilize Zentek's successful multivalent aptamer strategy, which was used to produce a countermeasure for SARS-CoV-2 that has shown efficacy against all known variants of SARS-CoV-2 it has been tested against.

The ISC program testing partners have prioritized the development of an H5N1 asset to enhance Canada's capabilities to respond to the global avian influenza outbreak. Since 2020, avian influenza has led to the destruction of millions of birds in the U.S. and has crossed species barriers, with confirmed cases in foxes, seals, sea lions and dairy cows. To date, over 1,000 dairy cattle herds across 17 U.S. states have experienced H5N1 outbreaks.

During the five months of lead candidate countermeasure development, the collaboration with McMaster University has focused on the following tasks: (1) selection of lead monomers with high binding affinity to the hemagglutinin (HA) protein and high specificity; (2) construction of multimeric forms of the lead monomers to increase overall avidity; and (3) in vitro testing to ensure the lead candidate aptamer has effective neutralization of H5N1 and other strains of influenza viruses to prevent cell infection.

The tasks mentioned above resulted in a lead candidate countermeasure that met the performance metrics established in the government of Canada testing contract. The recent in vitro neutralization experiments demonstrated that the lead candidate countermeasure matched the performance of a monoclonal antibody positive control.

Prof. Yingfu Li, department of biochemistry and biomedical sciences, commented: "Our collaboration with Zentek and Dr. Miller's group has been highly productive. From SARS-CoV-2 to H5N1, we have shown that multivalent aptamers can be powerful countermeasures. These efforts are helping us build a robust platform to rapidly generate high-quality aptamers for virtually any pathogen on demand."

The next phase of testing requires Zentek to deliver sufficient materials to Dr. Matthew Miller's team at McMaster University to evaluate the in vivo performance against H1N1 and the current clade of H5N1 influenza in circulation, H5N1 2.3.4.4b.

"There is growing interest in countermeasures for respiratory illnesses that are passive in nature which only neutralize a virus to either prevent infection or as a treatment. I want to thank Dr. Yingfu Li and his team, who have been tremendous collaborators, to allow us to deliver the asset on time. I also want to express my appreciation for the support and interest for the team and DRDC and HERC," said Greg Fenton, chief executive officer of Zentek.

About Zentek Ltd.

Zentek is an ISO 13485:2016-certified intellectual property technology company focused on the research, development and commercialization of novel products seeking to give the company's commercial partners a competitive advantage by making their products better, safer and greener.

Zentek's patented technology platform ZenGUARD is shown to significantly increase the bacterial and viral filtration efficiency of surgical masks, and aims to do the same with HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning system) filters. Zentek's ZenGUARD production facility is in Guelph, Ont.

Zentek, through its wholly owned subsidiary Triera Biosciences Ltd., has a global exclusive licence to the aptamer-based platform technology developed by McMaster University, which is being jointly developed by Zentek and McMaster for both the diagnostic and therapeutic markets.

The company is not making any express or implied claims that its aptamer technology has the ability to eliminate, cure or contain the COVID-19 disease (or the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus) at this time.

We seek Safe Harbor.