NantKwest Announces Landmark Study Published on high affinity haNK Cell Therapy in the Journal Oncotarget
November 22 2016 - 11:43AM
Business Wire
Next Generation NK Cell Therapy Poised to Transition into
Human Clinical Trials
NantKwest Inc. (Nasdaq:NK), a pioneering, next generation,
clinical-stage immunotherapy company focused on harnessing the
unique power of the immune system using natural killer (NK) cells
to treat cancer, infectious diseases and inflammatory diseases,
announced in a paper published today in the journal Oncotarget
results of a research study conducted at the National Cancer
Institute (NCI) in collaboration with scientists at NantKwest and
NantCell. The title of the paper is: An NK cell line (haNK)
expressing high levels of granzyme and engineered to express the
high affinity CD16 allele.
The study’s results highlight the key role natural killer (NK)
cells play in mediating innate immunity and enhancing adaptive
immune responses, as well as anti-tumor responses via
antibody-dependent cell-mediated cytotoxicity (ADCC) by activation
of the CD16 high affinity receptor with the Fc region of human IgG1
antibodies.
In this research study, aNK (NK-92) cells, lacking CD16, were
engineered to express the high affinity CD16 receptor (V158
FcγRIIIa) and further engineered to express IL-2. These high
affinity NK (haNK) cells, have been shown in previous studies to
enhanced perforin and granzyme-mediated killing of tumor cells, as
well as support the expansion of NK cell populations.
Study results showed high levels of granzyme activity in haNK
cells and demonstrated the effects of irradiation on haNK cell in
multiple phenotypic markers, viability, IL-2 production, and cell
killing in a wide range of human tumor cells. The study also
compared endogenous irradiated haNK cell killing of tumor cells
with that of irradiated haNK-mediated ADCC using cetuximab,
trastuzumab and pertuzumab monoclonal antibodies.
The senior author of the study, Jeffrey Schlom, PhD, Chief of
the Laboratory of Tumor Immunology and Biology at the National
Cancer Institute, commenting on the results, said the following:
“We believe these studies provide a strong rationale for the
potential use of haNK cells in NK cell-based therapy for a wide
range of human tumor types. In addition, since only about 10% of
humans are homozygous for the high affinity V CD16 allele, this
study also establishes a strong rationale for the use of haNK cells
in combination with IgG1 based monoclonal antibodies.”
Echoing Dr. Schlom’s conclusion, Patrick Soon-Shiong, MD, PhD,
Chairman and CEO of NantKwest and a co-senior author on the paper
said the following: “Ongoing preclinical studies using haNK cell
therapy in combination with antibody therapy offer the promising
potential to enhance the clinical efficacy of either agent alone
and become a part of the standard-of-care for cancer patients. With
this foundational data in place, we on now focused on rapidly
transitioning our haNK program into human clinical trials over the
next few months.”
NantKwest
NantKwest (Nasdaq:NK) is a pioneering, next generation,
clinical-stage immunotherapy company focused on harnessing the
unique power of our immune system using natural killer (NK) cells
to treat cancer, infectious diseases and inflammatory diseases. NK
cells are the body’s first line of defense due to the innate
ability of NK cells to rapidly identify and destroy cells under
stress, such as cancer or virally-infected cells.
NantKwest’s unique NK cell-based platform, with the capacity to
grow active killer cells as a biological cancer therapy, has been
designed to induce cell death against cancer or infected cells by
three different modes of action: (1) Direct killing using activated
NK cells (aNK) that release toxic granules directly into the cell
through cell to cell contact, (2) Antibody-mediated killing using
haNKs, which are NK cells engineered to incorporate a high affinity
receptor that binds to an administered antibody, enhancing the
cancer cell killing effect of that antibody, and (3) Targeted
activated killing using taNKs, which are NK cells engineered to
incorporate chimeric antigen receptors (CARs) to target
tumor-specific antigens found on the surface of cancer cells.
Our aNK, haNK and taNK platform addresses certain limitations of
T cell therapies including the reduction of risk of serious
"cytokine storms" reported after T cell therapy. As an
“off-the-shelf” therapy, NantKwest's NK cells do not rely on a
patient’s own often compromised immune system. In Phase 1 clinical
trials in patients with late stage cancer, NantKwest's NK cells
have been successfully administered as an outpatient infusion
therapy without any reported severe side effects, even at doses of
10 billion cells.
By leveraging an integrated and extensive genomics and
transcriptomics discovery and development engine, together with a
pipeline of multiple, clinical-stage, immuno-oncology programs that
include a Phase 2 trial for a rare form of melanoma and the planned
initiation of a clinical trial of NK cells targeted to breast
cancer, we believe NantKwest is uniquely positioned to be the
premier immunotherapy company and transform medicine by delivering
living drugs in a bag and bringing novel NK cell-based therapies to
routine clinical care. For more information, please visit
ýhttp://www.nantkwest.com.
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NantKwest Inc.Jen Hodson, 562-397-3639jhodson@nantworks.com
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