New therapeutic candidate offers potential to break the cycle driving antibiotic-resistant infections

IRVINE, Calif., July 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Qnovia, Inc., a clinical-stage pharmaceutical company, today announced it has secured a worldwide exclusive license to an innovative antimicrobial peptide from the University of Virginia Licensing & Ventures Group. The license marks Qnovia’s expansion into a second major therapeutic area, complementing its lead smoking cessation program as the company pursues breakthrough solutions to population-scale health challenges.

The peptide, called D8, works through a mechanism unlike that of conventional antibiotics and kills multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens and biodefense threat agents. Early laboratory and animal testing has demonstrated effectiveness against diverse human pathogens and shows promise for countering serious respiratory, bloodstream, skin, and soft-tissue infections.

“Drug-resistant bacteria represent one of the fastest-growing threats in global medicine, with antibiotic resistance already contributing to millions of deaths worldwide and impacting everything from routine surgeries to cancer treatment to intensive care,” said Mario Danek, founder and CEO of Qnovia. “What separates this peptide from existing antibiotics is that it doesn’t allow bacteria to evolve and adapt—it works through a mechanism that’s fundamentally different. That’s the kind of tool we need for a problem at this scale.”

Qnovia has collaborated with the Hughes-Crawford research group at UVA since 2023. Under the terms of the agreement, Qnovia now holds worldwide exclusive rights to develop and commercialize D8 across all disease indications and routes of administration. The company will determine the optimal delivery approach during the initial development phase, which will include preclinical studies to support an investigational new drug application.

“We’ve found a genuinely new way to fight life-threatening infections that have few, if any, effective treatment options,” said Matthew Crawford, PhD, Assistant Professor of Medicine at UVA. “It’s exactly the kind of discovery that university research exists to produce. Partnering with Qnovia gives peptide D8 a strong path out of the lab and to patients current antibiotics can’t help.”

Antibiotic resistance is projected by public health researchers to be among the most significant global health and economic challenges of the coming decades. A 2024 study by researchers with the Global Research on Antimicrobial Resistance (GRAM) Project projects antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections could lead to 39 million deaths by 2050. In 2019, these infections led to an estimated $693 billion in hospital costs and $194 billion in productivity losses worldwide.

About Qnovia, Inc.
Qnovia, Inc., is a clinical-stage pharmaceutical company focused on solving consequential public health challenges through breakthrough science and technology. The company is pursuing two major therapeutic areas: smoking cessation, through its lead program RespiRx™, a novel inhaled nicotine replacement therapy; and antimicrobial resistance, through a novel peptide licensed from the University of Virginia. Both programs target diseases affecting hundreds of millions of people globally and imposing enormous human and economic costs on society. Founded by Mario Danek in 2018, Qnovia is built to develop breakthrough therapies capable of changing health outcomes at population scale. Learn more at www.qnovia.com.

About the UVA Licensing & Ventures Group
UVA LVG is the intellectual property management and innovation commercialization organization for the University of Virginia research enterprise. Its mission is to grow and guide University innovations while improving lives on Grounds and around the world. To learn more, visit lvg.virginia.edu.

View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/qnovia-secures-worldwide-exclusive-license-to-novel-antimicrobial-peptide-from-the-university-of-virginia-302837273.html

SOURCE Qnovia, Inc.