Aptevo Therapeutics has preclinical data on immune system med

Aptevo Therapeutics announced the publication of preclinical data in Frontiers in Immunology highlighting the activity of APVO210 as a potent and selective immunosuppressive agent with potential utility in the treatment of multiple autoimmune and inflammatory conditions, such as psoriasis, inflammatory bowel disease, rheumatoid arthritis, graft-versus-host disease, lupus, as well as other diseases where there is antigen-driven activation of T lymphocyte-mediated disease. APVO210 is a bispecific antibody candidate built on Aptevo’s ADAPTIR therapeutic protein platform. It is designed to modulate and suppress pathological immune activation without lymphocyte activation by selectively delivering a modified form of IL-10 to antigen presenting cells via CD86 without stimulating IL-10 responses on resting and activated lymphocytes. Cytokines are pleiotropic and function by promoting or suppressing a variety of cellular functions, including inflammatory responses. Unregulated inflammation is believed to be responsible for a variety of chronic and acute inflammatory and autoimmune disorders. The cytokine IL-10 is known to play a key role in suppressing inflammation and, as a result, has been studied extensively by other companies in different clinical trials for autoimmune and inflammatory disorders. Unfortunately, the results of these studies have been disappointing. This may be due to the undesired stimulatory properties of IL-10, which exerts stimulatory effects on lymphocytes, promoting B-cell proliferation, immunoglobulin production and cytotoxic T-cell function, thus potentially reducing its overall therapeutic utility for immunosuppression. Conversely, APVO210 is designed to deliver a modified form of IL-10 to suppress inflammation and immune activation without lymphocyte stimulation. Importantly, APVO210 also retains the ability to mediate the differentiation of tolerogenic dendritic cells and antigen specific T regulatory cells. The company believes that APVO210 improves the anti-inflammatory properties of IL-10 in two ways. First by specifically targeting cells expressing CD86, such as monocytes, macrophages, and dendritic cells, while eliminating the undesired stimulation of lymphocytes including resting and activated T and B lymphocytes expressing the IL-10 receptor. Aptevo believes that the absence of lymphocyte stimulation associated with APVO210 may reduce the toxicities previously observed in other companies’ clinical studies testing repeat administration of IL-10 in humans. If confirmed, this could potentially allow for improved dosing and enhanced efficacy. In addition, preclinical studies of APVO210 show that it has a longer half-life in non-human primates compared to IL-10, which is approximately 4 hours. An increased half-life should support an opportunity for improved dosing regimens

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