BOSTON and GERMANTOWN, Md., Jan.
10, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- ZIOPHARM Oncology, Inc.
(Nasdaq:ZIOP), a biopharmaceutical company focused on new
immunotherapies, and Intrexon Corporation (NYSE:XON), a leader in
the engineering and industrialization of biology to improve the
quality of life and health of the planet, today announced the
signing of a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA)
with the National Cancer Institute (NCI) for the development of
adoptive cell transfer (ACT)-based immunotherapies genetically
modified using the Sleeping Beauty (SB)
transposon/transposase system to express T-cell receptors (TCRs)
for the treatment of solid tumors.
The principal goal of the CRADA is to develop and evaluate ACT
for patients with advanced cancers using autologous peripheral
blood lymphocytes (PBL) genetically modified using the non-viral SB
system to express TCRs that recognize specific immunogenic
mutations, or neoantigens, expressed within a patient's cancer.
Clinical evaluations of the ability of these SB-engineered
PBL to express TCRs reactive against cancer mutations to mediate
cancer regression in patients with metastatic disease will be
performed.
Research conducted under the CRADA will be at the direction
of Steven A. Rosenberg, M.D., Ph.D., Chief of the Surgery
Branch at the NCI's Center for Cancer Research, in collaboration
with researchers at ZIOPHARM and Intrexon.
"Treating liquid tumors with chimeric antigen receptors has
yielded extraordinary results with genetically engineered T cells
and the next stage in the evolution of this immunotherapy is the
expression of T-cell receptors to target solid tumors," said
Laurence Cooper, MD, PhD, Chief
Executive Officer of ZIOPHARM. "Through use of the scalable
non-viral Sleeping Beauty platform to express an array of
TCRs that recognize neoantigens within each patient's tumor, we can
customize T-cell therapies and enhance their function through
cytokines and switches."
The SB transposon-transposase is a unique system for introducing
genes encoding chimeric antigen receptors (CARs) and TCRs into
lymphocytes. This non-viral platform may play an important role in
immunotherapy and has several potential advantages over viral-based
delivery systems including lowering the cost of genetic
modification and the generation of T cells with minimal ex
vivo processing supporting the personalization of T-cell
therapy.
Dr. Cooper added, "The Sleeping Beauty system is the most
advanced non-viral cell engineering platform in clinical
development and we look forward to working with Dr. Rosenberg and
the NCI to explore its potential to express neoantigen-specific
TCRs to develop individualized immunotherapies for patients with
cancer."
About Intrexon Corporation:
Intrexon Corporation
(NYSE: XON) is Powering the Bioindustrial Revolution with Better
DNA™ to create biologically-based products that improve the quality
of life and the health of the planet. Intrexon's integrated
technology suite provides its partners across diverse markets with
industrial-scale design and development of complex biological
systems delivering unprecedented control, quality, function, and
performance of living cells. We call our synthetic biology approach
Better DNA®, and we invite you to discover more at
www.dna.com or follow us on Twitter at @Intrexon, on Facebook, and
LinkedIn.
About ZIOPHARM Oncology, Inc.:
ZIOPHARM Oncology is a
Boston, Massachusetts-based
biotechnology company employing novel gene expression, control and
cell technologies to deliver safe, effective and scalable cell- and
viral-based therapies for the treatment of cancer and
graft-versus-host-disease. The Company's immuno-oncology programs,
in collaboration with Intrexon Corporation (NYSE:XON) and the MD
Anderson Cancer Center, include chimeric antigen receptor T cell
(CAR-T) and other adoptive cell-based approaches that use non-viral
gene transfer methods for broad scalability. The Company is
advancing programs in multiple stages of development together with
Intrexon Corporation's RheoSwitch Therapeutic System® technology, a
switch to turn on and off, and precisely modulate, gene expression
in order to improve therapeutic index. The Company's pipeline
includes a number of cell-based therapeutics in both clinical and
preclinical testing which are focused on hematologic and solid
tumor malignancies.
Trademarks
RheoSwitch Therapeutic
System® (RTS®) technology is a
registered trademark of Intrexon Corporation.
Safe Harbor Statement
Some of the statements made in
this press release are forward-looking statements. These
forward-looking statements are based upon our current expectations
and projections about future events and generally relate to our
plans, objectives and expectations for the development of our
business. Although management believes that the plans and
objectives reflected in or suggested by these forward-looking
statements are reasonable, all forward-looking statements involve
risks and uncertainties and actual future results may be materially
different from the plans, objectives and expectations expressed in
this press release.
For more information, contact:
Intrexon Corporation
Investor Contact:
Christopher Basta
Vice President, Investor Relations
Tel: 561-410-7052
investors@intrexon.com
Corporate Contact:
Marie Rossi, Ph.D.
Senior Manager, Technical Communications
Tel: 301-556-9850
publicrelations@intrexon.com
ZIOPHARM:
Corporate Contact:
Lori Ann Occhiogrosso
ZIOPHARM Oncology, Inc.
617-259-1987
locchiogrosso@ziopharm.com
Investor Contact:
David Pitts
Argot Partners
212-600-1902
david@argotpartners.com
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SOURCE Intrexon Corporation; ZIOPHARM Oncology, Inc.