Date: 2018-10-18
Type of information: Collaboration agreement
Compound: universal CAR-T therapies based on convertibleCAR’® platform
Company: Xyphos Biosciences (USA - CA) The Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy (USA - CA)
Therapeutic area: Cancer - Oncology
Type agreement: collaboration
Action mechanism:
- cell therapy/immunotherapy product/gene therapy/CAR-T cell therapy.ACCEL™ (Advanced Cellular Control through Engineered Ligands) enables precise control of activity and targeting of Xyphos’ universal CAR-T cell, termed convertibleCAR-T. Xyphos’ convertible CAR technology exploits a powerful immune surveillance pathway involving NKG2D receptors that are naturally present on different cell types within the immune system including natural killer (NK) cells, T-cells and some macrophages. Through protein engineering, Xyphos engineered the natural NKG2D receptor to be inactive until activated by a proprietary bispecific antibody also engineered by Xyphos, called a MicAbody® protein. Once the MicAbody is introduced, one end binds exclusively to the inactive NKG2D receptors on the convertibleCAR-T cell, and when the other end of the MicAbody binds the antibody-targeted cell, the convertibleCAR-T cell aggressively attacks and destroys the targeted malignant cell.
- The resulting platform enables a single NKG2D CAR-T cell therapy to be precisely controlled and targeted to any antigen-expressing cell of choice using one or more tumor-specific MicAbody proteins. Using bispecific MIC-effector fusions (MicAdaptor™ proteins), Xyphos can externally add critical functionality (e.g. cytokine stimulation, checkpoint blockade, cell ablation, imaging biomarkers) specifically to the Xyphos convertibleCAR-T cells.
Disease:
Details:
- • On October 18, 2018, The Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy and Xyphos Biosciences announced a collaboration to create universal CAR-T therapies to treat multiple cancer types using the company’s ‘convertibleCAR’® platform. Using this type of cell therapy, researchers endeavor to program a patient’s own immune cells to attack tumor cells with greater specificity, and potentially lower toxicity, when directed to tumor antigens with separate targeting antibodies. Unlike the first generation of approved cell therapies, this technology aims to allow more controlled antigen recognition for greater responsiveness to the tumor environment.
- “This new approach provides a way to switch CAR-Ts on and off, which we hope will translate to greater efficacy and safety,” said Jeffrey Bluestone, CEO and president of the Parker Institute. “This technology has the potential to be best-in-class and applicable to a wide array of solid tumor targets.”
- During the initial phase of research, the Parker Institute and Xyphos will work together on building and evaluating CAR-T cell product candidates against a variety of cancer cell surface targets.
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