Biotech company CytomX has created two new advisory boards, a scientific and a clinical one, comprised of leading investigators and physicians specialized in cancer immunotherapy and antibody drug conjugates. The new boards will support the company in its mission of developing a novel treatment for cancer, called Probody therapeutics.
The experts invited to join the advisory boards will assist CytomX in developing its pipeline of precision immunotherapies and Probody drug conjugates. The company selected the researchers based on their achievements in the field, according to a press release from the company.
The new Immunotherapy Advisory Board will include assistant professor of medicine at the Stanford University Medical Center, Holbrook Kohrt, MD, PhD, as well as professor of medicine and hematology/oncology, at the University of California, Los Angeles, Antoni Ribas, MD, PhD, and director of the Donald A. Adam Comprehensive Melanoma Research Center – Moffitt Cancer Center, Jeffrey Weber, MD, PhD.
The Antibody Drug Conjugate Advisory Board will include the Harry C. and Olga K. Wiess professor of chemistry at Rice University, K.C. Nicolaou, PhD, as well as the director of the Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, Louis Weiner, MD, and the physician-in-chief and distinguished professor at the Translational Genomics Research Institute, Daniel Von Hoff, MD.
In addition, the biotechnology company expects to expand its current scientific advisory board, which is going to continue its work on the Probody technology platform. Probodies are masked antibodies that stay inert in healthy tissue while activated in the tumor micro-environment. Probody works by mitigating the systemic toxicities from antibodies and expanding the therapy with new targets.
“Our Probody technology enables a wide array of therapeutic antibody modalities, including immunotherapies, Probody drug conjugates, bispecifics and engineered T-cell therapies. We are excited to be working with such accomplished advisors as we move our proprietary pipeline towards the clinic,” said the CEO of CytomX, Sean McCarthy, D. Phil. “Our advisory boards will be instrumental in helping us design translational clinical strategies to achieve proof of concept for our highly differentiated programs.”
Primarily focused on developing novel immunotherapies and antibody drug conjugates, CytomX has also established several collaborations for the development of Probody. Among its industry partners are companies like Pfizer Inc., ImmunoGen and Bristol-Myers Squibb, while the company is being financially supported by life science investors, such as Third Rock Ventures, Canaan Partners, Roche Venture Fund and Pfizer Venture Investments.
In addition to CytomX and its Probody, there are several other companies and investigators currently focused in the field of immunotherapy for the treatment of cancer. Recent research conducted at the Institute for Immunology from the University Medical Center of the Johannes Gutenberg-University, in Mainz, Germany, discovered a novel subpopulation of regulatory T cells that could be used as an early diagnostic biomarker of susceptibility to allergic diseases and may change the treatment of several types of cancer.
