GVAX

GVAX is a cancer vaccine composed of whole tumor cells genetically modified to secrete the immune stimulatory cytokine, granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF), and then irradiated to prevent further cell division. The product exists as both autologous (patient specific) and allogeneic (non-patient specific) therapy.[1]

History

GVAX was developed around 1993 by Glenn Dranoff, a cancer researcher then at the Whitehead Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts.[2] The therapy was initially developed by a public gene therapy company called Somatix, which was acquired in 1997 by Cell Genesys.[3] That company took the vaccine into Phase III trials in 2004 however these trials were halted in 2008 due to an apparent lack of efficacy.[4] Cell Genesys continued development, however in August 2009, due to funding difficulties, the company announced that it was merging with BioSante Pharmaceuticals.[5] In 2013 BioSante sold the GVAx program to Aduro Biotech, a company based in Berkeley, California.[6]

Current development

Aduro Biotech is currently in Phase II with GVAX in pancreatic cancer, where the company is also trialing a combination of GVAX with a PD-1 inhibitor.[7]

gollark: It's also reasonably fast *and* not wildly unsafe!
gollark: Don't activate Windows. Windows bad.
gollark: Yes. I have no idea why you are showing people this.
gollark: > haskell is the only language that enforces separation between computation and effectsReally? Don't PureScript and probably other derivatives/similar languages do that?
gollark: I'm thinking it could include actual formatting, Unicode, headers, that sort of thing. As well as possibly decent autogen scripts allowing each sentence to be given its own header saying "Section 1, Clause 8" or something, and maybe even JS to dynamically edit the text a bit as you scroll.

References
  1. Hege KM, Jooss K, Pardoll D (September 2006). "GM-CSF gene-modifed [sic] cancer cell immunotherapies: of mice and men". Int Rev Immunol. 25 (5–6): 321–352. doi:10.1080/08830180600992498. PMID 17169779.
  2. Dranoff, Glenn (15 April 1993). "Vaccination with irradiated tumor cells engineered to secrete murine granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor stimulates potent, specific, and long-lasting anti-tumor immunity". Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 90 (8): 3539–43. doi:10.1073/pnas.90.8.3539. PMC 46336. PMID 8097319.
  3. "Cell Genesys to Buy Somatix Therapy". Los Angeles Times. 14 January 1997.
  4. "Cell Genesys Halts VITAL-2 GVAX Trial in Advanced Prostate Cancer". Business Wire. 27 August 2008.
  5. Carroll, John (10 August 2009). "BioSante, Cell Genesys merger will provide cash for Phase III". Fierce Biotech. Retrieved 7 May 2015.
  6. "Aduro announces acquisition of GVAX assets from BioSante". Aduro Biotech. 4 February 2013. Retrieved 7 May 2015.
  7. "Aduro Biotech pipeline". Retrieved 7 May 2015.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.