By GREGORY ZELLER //
New vaccines produced in part by a progressive Long Island biotech could significantly increase the efficacy of existing cancer treatments.
The potential breakthrough – detailed this month in a manuscript posted on bioRxiv, an open-access preprint repository for the biological sciences hosted by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory – comes courtesy of Stony Brook-based Applied DNA Sciences and EvviVax, the local innovator’s Italy-based program partner.
EvviVax, which focuses primarily on veterinary medicine, is a spinoff of frequent Applied DNA collaborator Takis Biotech, which has already partnered with Applied DNA on numerous programs targeting cancer and SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.
According to the study, cancer immunotherapy vaccines created using LinearDNA, the Stony Brook company’s proprietary DNA-sequencing technology, “produced a strong immune and specific antitumoral response” in preclinical mouse models.
James Hayward: Coming for cancer.
That potentially marks a huge leap toward pan-cancer vaccines that could increase the efficacy of cancer immunotherapies, when used in conjunction with other mainstream treatment protocols.
This exciting news follows a promising 2019 study that showcased two encouraging cancer vaccine candidates produced by Applied DNA subsidiary LineaRX and Takis Biotech. Those vaccines demonstrated an ability to “eliminate (cancer) tumors … and to potentially prevent initial occurrence,” according to LineaRX, which spun off from Applied DNA in 2018 to focus on the modification and production of unique DNA strands by large-scale polymerase chain reaction.
Applied DNA has not cured cancer – in fact, the latest study, while very hopeful, is still being considered for peer-reviewed publication. And even if it earns that distinction, there are many more steps to take before LineaRX and EvviVax begin churning out a bona fide pan-cancer vaccine.
But the new study “validates the use of LinearDNA as a more cost- and time-efficient alternative to plasmid DNA for DNA-based cancer vaccines,” according to Applied DNA Sciences President and CEO James Hayward.
And it opens the door to many exciting developments in the war against cancer, according to EvviVax CEO and Chief Scientific Officer Luigi Aurisicchio.
“We believe that DNA vaccines for cancer hold immense promise for both human and veterinary applications,” Aurisicchio said in a statement. “We believe that the completely cell-free LinearDNA platform avoids the numerous pitfalls of plasmid DNA-based production, making it ideal for DNA vaccine manufacturing broadly, and in cancer immunotherapy specifically.”
