Post by icemandios on Apr 9, 2024 12:53:22 GMT
Candel Therapeutics Presents Preclinical Data At AACR On Immunotherapy Candidate For Induction Of Tertiary Lymphoid Structures In Solid Tumors
First-in-class multimodal immunotherapy candidate, for induction of tertiary lymphoid structures, being developed as a novel therapeutic strategy for solid tumors from the enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform
Delivery of two unique payload combinations, predicted in silico using the enLIGHTEN™ Advanced Analytics suite, was shown to induce tertiary lymphoid structure formation, inhibit tumor growth, and improve response to immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy in preclinical models of cancer
This presentation accelerates the milestone associated with the second immunotherapy candidate based on the enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform, which was originally anticipated in the third quarter of 2024
TLSs are ectopic lymphocyte aggregation structures found in the tumor microenvironment and their induction could potentially improve anti-tumor immunity. The presentation describes the development of an investigational TLS-inducing multimodal therapeutic using the enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform. The enLIGHTEN™ Advanced Analytics suite was applied to immune checkpoint inhibitor-treated patient datasets, and the predicted payload components included factors regulating the development of TLS. Delivery of two unique in silico predicted payload combinations, using an enLIGHTEN™ programmable vector, resulted in TLS induction, monotherapy anti-tumoral activity, and enhanced responses in combination with anti-PD-1 antibody therapy in mouse models of solid tumors.
“The recent observation that the presence of TLS in tumors is an important prognostic factor associated with an improved response to immunotherapy has fueled drug development efforts in this area. However, TLS assembly is complicated and requires a series of events, including antigen presentation, stromal cell activation, and immune cell activation and aggregation, which are difficult to obtain with a single therapeutic,” said Francesca Barone, MD, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer at Candel. “The enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform enables the generation of multimodal agents through the integration of artificial intelligence-driven payload combinations into programmable vectors. This makes it possible to create a single asset that may induce TLS formation and enhance anti-tumor immunity.”
“The delivery of the second immunotherapy candidate based on the enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform, on an accelerated timeline, further validates the ability of this innovative platform to create new therapeutic candidates at a fast pace,” added Paul Peter Tak, MD, PhD, FMedSci, President and Chief Executive Officer of Candel. “Our platform is flexible and scalable, which makes it suitable for strategic partnerships, for example to create synergy with CAR-T cell therapy or other immunotherapies, potentially resulting in improved survival rates.”
Further detail from Candel’s AACR full poster presentation is available on the Candel website at: www.candeltx.com/media .
About the enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform
The enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform is a systematic, iterative herpes simplex virus (HSV)-based discovery platform leveraging human biology and advanced analytics to create new multimodal biological immunotherapies for solid tumors. The enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform has been designed to deconvolute the characteristics of the tumor microenvironment related to clinical outcomes. These characteristics are rapidly translated into optimized multi-gene payloads of tumor modulators that can be delivered to the tumor microenvironment for specific indications, disease stages, and rationally designed therapeutic combinations. In 2022, the Company announced a discovery partnership with the University of Pennsylvania Center for Cellular Immunotherapies to create new viral immunotherapies that could enhance the efficacy of chimeric antigen receptor T cell (CAR-T) therapy in solid tumors. During the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) 2023 Annual Meeting and the 2023 International Oncolytic Virus Conference, Candel presented encouraging data on the first candidate from this platform, Alpha 201-macro-1, which was designed to interfere with the CD47/SIRP1α pathway, in mouse models of breast cancer and lung cancer.
About Candel Therapeutics
Candel is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing off-the-shelf multimodal biological immunotherapies that elicit an individualized, systemic anti-tumor immune response to help patients fight cancer. Candel has established two clinical stage multimodal biological immunotherapy platforms based on novel, genetically modified adenovirus and herpes simplex virus (HSV) gene constructs, respectively. CAN-2409 is the lead product candidate from the adenovirus platform and is currently in ongoing clinical trials in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) (phase 2), borderline resectable PDAC (phase 2), and localized, non-metastatic prostate cancer (phase 2 and phase 3). CAN-3110 is the lead product candidate from the HSV platform and is currently in an ongoing investigator-sponsored phase 1 clinical trial in recurrent high-grade glioma (rHGG). Finally, Candel’s enLIGHTEN™ Discovery Platform is a systematic, iterative HSV-based discovery platform leveraging human biology and advanced analytics to create new viral immunotherapies for solid tumors.
For more information about Candel, visit: www.candeltx.com .