Cytokines are secreted proteins that mediate intercellular communication and orchestrate immunity, inflammation and hematopoiesis and are key regulators of the immune system. The over-expression of cytokines is well established as a causative element in many human diseases, including autoimmune disorders and cancers.

Drugs, and especially passive immunotherapies such as monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), that block the activity of a target cytokine have shown substantial efficacy in such disorders in recent years. For example, biological products targeting the blockade of TNFα have made a major impact in the treatment of chronic autoimmune and inflammatory disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis (RA), Crohn’s Disease (CD) and psoriasis. Drugs targeting VEGF have also been approved for certain cancers and Age-related Macular Degeneration (AMD) and multiple other biologic products targeting cytokines, including IL-6, IL-12 and IL-23, are either in review or have recently received marketing approval. The antibody-mediated blockade of cytokines is therefore well established as an efficacious therapeutic approach.

However, current approaches also suffer from major shortcomings: Monoclonal antibodies target a single epitope and are thus not always efficacious against targets that are variable or which occur naturally in multiple subtypes. The administration of “foreign” proteins can generate resistance leading to loss of efficacy and potential side-effects; these drugs are very costly, raising affordability issues for payors and access issues for patients; they typically require a cumbersome regime of frequent injections; and they may also suppress the desirable activity of the target cytokine, leading to unwanted side effects.

Neovacs’ active immunotherapy approach has the potential to address all these shortcomings.

Neovacs is developing a novel immunotherapy platform technology based upon inactivated cytokines, conjugated to a carrier protein and delivered with an adjuvant, or immune stimulant. The strategy is to elicit a natural polyclonal antibody response to the protein, which will neutralize the pathologic, over-expressed cytokine and thus address a key component of the disease pathology.