Suppression of Transplant Rejection - Isis Project No 1439

Therapeutic Areas

Transplantation, auto-immune diseases and disorders.

Introduction

Transplantation is the treatment of choice for end stage kidney, heart, liver and pancreas organ failure.  Despite considerable advances in the management of transplant rejection in recent years the vast majority of transplants are still eventually rejected.  In addition, the current immunosuppressive regimens which depend on continual drug therapy predispose transplant recipients to increased susceptibility to infections and more importantly to cancer because even the most sophisticated drugs are unable to inhibit just those responses directed toward the transplant. 

The Technology

T-helper lymphocytes are cells of the immune system that, under normal circumstances, play an essential role in immune responses that protect us from pathogenic organisms.  In the context of transplantation however, these same cells are largely responsible for the rejection of organ transplants.  It is widely known that rejection responses can be attenuated by the administration of immunosuppressive agents which target CD4+ T cells and more recently it has been shown that such therapy can lead to the generation of sub-populations of T cells known as “regulatory T cells” with the capacity to control destructive rejection responses.

The patent applications describe novel methods for the generation of regulatory T cells both in vivo and ex vivo. With respect to in vivo generation, immunisation with a non-cellular antigen combined with a monoclonal antibody is followed by a second challenge with the non-cellular antigen at or near the point of transplantation.

Benefits

The in vivo approach has the potential to control transplantation rejection by administration of a simple, non-cellular antigen combined with a monoclonal antibody such as anti-CD4. In a clinical context, it is anticipated that patients would be pre-exposed to this therapy before transplantation and their resulting regulatory T cell population maintained by re-challenging with the non-cellular antigen until transplantation.  This approach does not require that the identity of the organ donor is known before the therapy commences.  The ex vivo approach could enable introduction of regulatory T cells directly to control transplantation rejection at the time of transplantation or at any point thereafter to ensure control rejection is maintained.   The in vivo and ex vivo approaches have the potential to be used in combination.

Commercial Opportunity

The patent applications are available for licence and we are actively seeking partners for the licensing and commercial development of this technology.

 

Request Further Information: Project Number 1439 - Suppression of Transplant Rejection