Viventia identifies target of VB1-050

Canada's Viventia Biotech has generated a novel, fully-human anticancer antibody, VB1-050, and also identified the agent's novel target - a mutant form of Glut-8, a protein whose overexpression is associated with the likelihood of disease metastasis and hence poor patient prognosis.

These data were presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research, held in Los Angeles, California, and Viventia says further research is ongoing to assess the potential clinical exploitation of VB1-050/Glut-8.

Viventia's approach to drug discovery is to leverage the human immune system's response to cancer to generate novel anticancer antibodies and identify novel cancer targets. VB1-050, an IgG MAb, was generated from pooled lymphocytes of cancer patient samples, using Viventia's Hybridomics platform. The novel antibody demonstrates preferential binding to a host of tumor cell lines, including breast, liver, prostate and colon, with limited normal tissue reactivity. Further, internalization of VB1-050 was confirmed by the disappearance of membrane-bound VB1-050 and its appearance inside the cell, the firm noted.