Bet­ting on al­losteric mu­ta­tions dri­ving can­cer, Black Di­a­mond rais­es $85M in fresh round

Near­ly a month af­ter emerg­ing from “stealth mode,” David Ep­stein-led can­cer up­start Black Di­a­mond Ther­a­peu­tics said it has raised $85 mil­lion in a Se­ries B round, bring­ing the funds raised by the first com­pa­ny out of Ver­sant’s Ridge­line dis­cov­ery en­gine in Basel to $105 mil­lion.

Onco­genes — which have the po­ten­tial to cause the growth of can­cer cells — are ac­ti­vat­ed by ki­nase do­main mu­ta­tions or by al­losteric mu­ta­tions. Al­lostery is a com­mon process by which pro­teins trans­mit the ef­fect of bind­ing at one site to an­oth­er, of­ten dis­tal, func­tion­al site, al­low­ing for reg­u­la­tion of ac­tiv­i­ty.

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