Empowered Patient Podcast Engineered Cytokines and Attacking Solid Tumors with IL-2 Superkines with Dr. Fahar Merchant Medicenna Therapeutics
Dr. Fahar Merchant, President, CEO, and Co-Founder of Medicenna Therapeutics, talks about the role cytokines play in managing the immune system, activating the system, or dampening the immune response depending on the circumstances. When the system is out of balance, pathogens and cancers can attack, or autoimmune diseases can occur. MDNA11 is an engineered cytokine or superkine which can be used to effectively deliver drugs to treat a range of solid tumors. in addition, MDNA11 is being fused with a checkpoint inhibitor to both stimulate the immune system and reverse the exhaustion of cancer-fighting immune cells.
Fahar elaborates, "Engineered cytokines, or superkines, essentially have been designed so that these molecules are much more effective, they're much safer to administer, and therefore have better outcomes than naturally occurring cytokines. So naturally occurring cytokines tend to be rather small. They clear the kidneys very, very quickly, so they're not in the bloodstream for long enough."
"The other thing is that some of these cytokines can be very toxic when administered in large quantities. Scientists at Stanford University looked at these cytokines. We'll talk about three cytokines, interleukin-2, interleukin-4, and interleukin-13, and thus engineered them in such a way that they can be much more effective, more potent, but at the same time much safer as well. So that's why we call them engineered. That's why we call them superkines because they are much more potent, much more powerful, than our own naturally occurring cytokines floating in our bloodstream."
#Medicenna #Oncology #Cancer #Superkines #Cytokines #IL2 #Immunotherapy