Empowered Patient Podcast Targeting Activation of the Immune System at the Site of the Tumor with Dr. Edith Perez Bolt Biotherapeutics
Dr. Edith Perez, Chief Medical Officer at Bolt Biotherapeutics, describes the innovative approach Bolt is taking to bring together the precision of antibodies against the tumor with the power of the innate and adaptive immune system by activating the immune system at the tumor site. This approach can minimize side effects from systematic activation of the immune system and reinforce long-term anti-tumor efficacy.
Edith explains, "The myeloid cells are a wide range of cells in the body, and initially, the myeloid cells can start attacking the tumors right away. But as important, or even more importantly, is that they secrete the cytokines and chemokines to teach the T-cells to essentially develop an immunological memory to be able to fight these foreign bodies for a long time."
"First of all, there are the abnormalities of the tumor themselves, and we target those with monoclonal antibodies. Then we actually link that with what we call a non-cleavable and non-cell permeable linker. Again, the idea is to bring the activation of the immune system right at the site of the tumor, which could be dramatic for humans."
"So these monoclonal antibodies essentially find the tumor cells because the tumor cells are circulating, they're in the body, so they latch onto these proteins in the membrane and with our compound, with our Boltbody compounds. What we have here is the attachment of the monoclonal antibodies with what we call the linker payload. The payload is really the activation factor of the immune system. We bring that activation of the immune system, tied into the monoclonal antibody, to the site of the tumor. That way, we can be very precise related to where the activity of the compound will occur."
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