5 January 2012 - Australian Prana Biotechnology (NASDAQ:PRAN) said on Wednesday it had got the green light from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to begin recruiting patients for its first clinical trial using PBT2 in Huntington's disease (HD) patients.

PBT2 is the company's lead Metal-Protein Attenuating Compound, or MPAC.

Prana has hired the Huntington Study Group (HSG) to coordinate the Phase IIa trial. It is a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled study, which will enroll 100 patients with early to mid-stage Huntington's disease at US and Australian facilities.