The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) recently awarded $1.5 million to Denise Al Alam, PhD, of the Lundquist Institute for Biomedical Innovation at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center to support research that aims to understand lung disease in individuals with Trisomy 21, also known as Down Syndrome.
Although Trisomy 21 affects multiple organ systems, respiratory complications are a major cause of death in both children and adults with this genetic condition. Dr. Al Alam’s project will use patient-derived pluripotent stem cells from ethnically diverse backgrounds to model alveolar defects inherent to Trisomy 21.
The study is poised to generate new Trisomy 21 cell lines to study defects specific to this condition. Researchers hope to uncover the genes and pathways associated with these defects, paving the way for targeted therapeutic approaches.
In California, about 667 babies are born with Down Syndrome every year, with the highest rate among Latinx infants.
“Respiratory complications are a significant cause of mortality in both children and adults with Down Syndrome. We are thrilled to support this research that aims to deepen our understanding of lung disease in individuals with Down Syndrome. This knowledge holds immense potential to intervene early and improve outcomes for those with this condition,” added Dr. Canet-Avilés.
Understanding lung disease in individuals with Trisomy 21 is crucial to improving outcomes for those living with this genetic condition. This innovative research project has the potential to lead to targeted therapeutic approaches and improve the quality of life for those affected by Trisomy 21.
Every year California performs around 100 kidney transplants in children but, on average, around 50 of these patients will have their body reject the transplant. These children then have to undergo regular dialysis while waiting for a new organ. Even the successful transplants require a lifetime of immunosuppression medications. These medications can prevent rejection but they also increase the risk of infection, gastrointestinal disease, pancreatitis and cancer.
Dr. Alice Bertaina and her team at Stanford University were awarded $11,998,188 to test an approach that uses combined blood stem cell (HSC) and kidney transplantation with the goal to improve outcomes with kidney transplantation in children. This approach seeks to improve on the blood stem cell preparation through an immune-based purification process.
In this approach, the donor HSC are transplanted into the patient in order to prepare for the acceptance of the donor kidney once transplanted. Donor HSC give rise to cells and conditions that re-train the immune system to accept the kidney. This creates a “tolerance” to the transplanted kidney providing the opportunity to avoid long-term need for medications that suppress the immune system.
Pre-clinical data support the idea that this approach could enable the patient to stop taking any immunosuppression medications within 90 days of the surgery.
Dr. Maria T. Millan, President and CEO of CIRM, a former pediatric transplant surgeon and tolerance researcher states that “developing a way to ensure long-term success of organ transplantation by averting immune rejection while avoiding the side-effects of life-long immunosuppression medications would greatly benefit these children.”
The CIRM Board also awarded $7,141,843 to Dr. Ivan Kingand Tachyon Therapeutics, Inc to test a drug showing promise in blocking the proliferation of cancer stem cells in solid tumors such as colorectal and gastrointestinal cancer.
Patients with late-stage colorectal cancer are typically given chemotherapy to help stop or slow down the progression of the disease. However, even with this intervention survival rates are low, usually not more than two years.
Tachyon’s medication, calledTACH101, is intended to target colorectal cancer (CRC) stem cells as well as the bulk tumor by blocking an enzyme called KDM4, which cancer stem cells need to grow and proliferate.
In the first phase of this trial Dr. King and his team will recruit patients with advanced or metastatic solid tumors to assess the safety of TACH101, and determine what is the safest maximum dose. In the second phase of the trial, patients with gastrointestinal tumors and colorectal cancer will be treated using the dose determined in the first phase, to determine how well the tumors respond to treatment.
The CIRM Board also awarded $5,999,919 to Dr. Natalia Gomez-Ospina and her team at Stanford University for a late-stage preclinical program targeting Severe Mucopolysaccharidosis type 1, also known as Hurler syndrome. This is an inherited condition caused by a faulty gene. Children with Hurler syndrome lack an enzyme that the body needs to digest sugar. As a result, undigested sugar molecules build up in the body, causing progressive damage to the brain, heart, and other organs. There is no effective treatment and life expectancy for many of these children is only around ten years.
Dr. Gomez-Ospina will use the patient’s own blood stem cells that have been genetically edited to restore the missing enzyme. The goal of this preclinical program is to show the team can manufacture the needed cells, to complete safety studies and to apply to the US Food and Drug Administration for an Investigational New Drug (IND), the authorization needed to begin a clinical trial in people.
Finally the Board awarded $20,401,260 to five programs as part of its Translational program. The goal of the Translational program is to support promising stem cell-based or gene projects that accelerate completion of translational stage activities necessary for advancement to clinical study or broad end use. Those can include therapeutic candidates, diagnostic methods or devices and novel tools that address critical bottlenecks in research.
The successful applicants are:
APPLICATION
TITLE
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR – INSTITUTION
AMOUNT
TRAN4-14124
Cell Villages and Clinical Trial in a Dish with Pooled iPSC-CMs for Drug Discovery
Nikesh Kotecha — Greenstone Biosciences
$1,350,000
TRAN1-14003
Specific Targeting Hypoxia Metastatic Breast Tumor with Allogeneic Off-the-Shelf Anti-EGFR CAR NK Cells Expressing an ODD domain of HIF-1α
Jianhua Yu — Beckman Research Institute of City of Hope
$6,036,002
TRAN1-13983
CRISPR/Cas9-mediated gene editing of Hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells for Friedreich’s ataxia
Stephanie Cherqui — University of California, San Diego
$4,846,579
TRAN1-13997
Development of a Gene Therapy for the Treatment of Pitt Hopkins Syndrome (PHS) – Translating from Animal Proof of Concept to Support Pre-IND Meeting
Allyson Berent — Mahzi Therapeutics
$4,000,000
TRAN1-13996
Overcoming resistance to standard CD19-targeted CAR T using a novel triple antigen targeted vector
William J Murphy — University of California, Davis
While stem cell and gene therapy research has advanced dramatically in recent years, there are still many unknowns and many questions remaining about how best to use these approaches in developing therapies. That’s why the governing Board of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) today approved investing almost $25 million in 19 projects in early stage or Discovery research.
The awards are from CIRM’s DISC2 Quest program, which supports the discovery of promising new stem cell-based and gene therapy technologies that could be translated to enable broad use and ultimately, improve patient care.
“Every therapy that helps save lives or change lives begins with a researcher asking a simple question, “What if?”, says Dr. Maria T. Millan, the President and CEO of CIRM. “Our Quest awards reflect the need to keep supporting early stage research, to gain a deeper understanding of stem cells work and how we can best tap into that potential to advance the field.”
Dr. Judy Shizuru at Stanford University was awarded $1.34 million to develop a safer, less-toxic form of bone marrow or hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HCT). HCT is the only proven cure for many forms of blood disorders that affect people of all ages, sexes, and races worldwide. However, current methods involve the use of chemotherapy or radiation to destroy the patient’s own unhealthy blood stem cells and make room for the new, healthy ones. This approach is toxic and complex and can only be performed by specialized teams in major medical centers, making access particularly difficult for poor and underserved communities.
Dr. Shizuru proposes developing an antibody that can direct the patient’s own immune cells to kill diseased blood stem cells. This would make stem cell transplant safer and more effective for the treatment of many life-threatening blood disorders, and more accessible for people in rural or remote parts of the country.
Lili Yang UCLA Broad Stem Cell Research Center: Photo courtesy Reed Hutchinson PhotoGraphics
Dr. Lili Yang at UCLA was awarded $1.4 million to develop an off-the-shelf cell therapy for ovarian cancer, which causes more deaths than any other cancer of the female reproductive system.
Dr. Yang is using immune system cells, called invariant natural killer T cells (iNKT) to attack cancer cells. However, these iNKT cells are only found in small numbers in the blood so current approaches involve taking those cells from the patient and, in the lab, modifying them to increase their numbers and strength before transplanting them back into the patient. This is both time consuming and expensive, and the patient’s own iNKT cells may have been damaged by the cancer, reducing the likelihood of success.
In this new study Dr. Yang will use healthy donor cord blood cells and, through genetic engineering, turn them into the specific form of iNKT cell therapy targeting ovarian cancer. This DISC2 award will support the development of these cells and do the necessary testing and studies to advance it to the translational stage.
Timothy Hoey and Tenaya Therapeutics Inc. have been awarded $1.2 million to test a gene therapy approach to replace heart cells damaged by a heart attack.
Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the U.S. with the highest incidence among African Americans. It’s caused by damage or death of functional heart muscle cells, usually due to heart attack. Because these heart muscle cells are unable to regenerate the damage is permanent. Dr. Hoey’s team is developing a gene therapy that can be injected into patients and turn their cardiac fibroblasts, cells that can contribute to scar tissue, into functioning heart muscle cells, replacing those damaged by the heart attack.
DNA provides the code of life for nearly all living organisms. So, it’s no wonder that scientists have been studying DNA and the human genome (complete set of DNA) for decades.
In April 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick, in collaboration with Rosalind Franklin, first described the structure of DNA as a double helix. In April 2003, exactly 50 years later, scientists completed the Human Genome Project- a massive research effort to sequence and map all the genes that comprise the human genome.
That same year, Congress approved the first National DNA Day to commemorate both the discovery of the double helix and the completion of the Human Genome Project. The goal of National DNA Day is to offer students, educators, and the public an opportunity to learn about the DNA molecule and genomic research.
You can celebrate National DNA Day this year by following scientists Lilly Lee and Tom Quinn at Takara Bio as they demonstrate how to extract DNA from strawberries. Their lesson plan guides mentors to teach about DNA and genomic research, starting with having students extract DNA on their own.
Laurel Barchas, one of the people behind the video has also played an important role at the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM). She has collaborated with us on many projects over the years, including helping us build CIRM’s own education portal with lessons for high school students that meet Next Generation Science Standards.
Watch the video below and Click Here for the full lesson plan!
Caleb Sizemore says growing up with Duchenne’s Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) was tough. The disease is a rare genetic disorder that slowly destroys a person’s muscles, impairing their ability to walk or breathe. Eventually it attacks the heart leading to premature death.
Caleb says the disease meant “I was limited in what I could do, where I couldn’t play sports and where I was teased and bullied sometimes for being different.”
In the past people with DMD – almost all of whom are boys – lost the ability to walk by the age of 12, and many died in their 20’s. But a new treatment – originally funded by CIRM – is showing promise in helping reverse some of the damage caused by the disease.
Dr. Craig McDonald working with a person who has DMD: Photo courtesy UC Davis
Results from a clinical trial – published in the journal Lancet – showed that the therapy helped halt the decline in muscle strength in the arms and hands, and in MRI’s appeared to improve heart function.
In a news release, Dr. Craig McDonald, a UC Davis professor and the lead author of the study, said: “The trial produced statistically significant and unprecedented stabilization of both skeletal muscle deterioration affecting the arms and heart deterioration of structure and function in non-ambulatory DMD patients.”
The therapy, called CAP-1002, uses cells derived from the human heart that have previously demonstrated the ability to reduce muscle inflammation and enhance cell regeneration. The clinical trial, called HOPE-2 (Halt cardiomyopathy progression in Duchenne).
Dr. McDonald says with current treatments only having a limited impact on the disease, CAP-1002 may have a big impact on the people affected by DMD and their families.
“The trial showed consistent benefits of this cell-based therapy. It suggests that this infusion may be an important treatment option for the boys and young men who have this debilitating disorder.”
The team now hope to be able to apply to the Food and Drug Administration for permission to start a bigger clinical trial involving more patients.
Caleb Sizemore took part in an earlier clinical trial involving this approach. He says MRI’s showed that the therapy appeared to reduce scarring on his heart and gave him greater energy.
In 2017 Caleb talked to the CIRM governing Board about DMD and his part in the clinical trial. You can see that video here.
It’s hard to think of something as being rare when it affects up to 30 million Americans and 300 million people worldwide. But the truth is there are more than 6,000 conditions – those affecting 200,000 people or fewer – that are considered rare.
Today, February 28th, is Rare Disease Day. It’s a day to remind ourselves of the millions of people, and their families, struggling with these diseases. These conditions are also called or orphan diseases because, in many cases, drug companies were not interested in adopting them to develop treatments.
At the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), we have no such reservations. In fact last Friday our governing Board voted to invest almost $12 million to support a clinical trial for IPEX syndrome. IPEX syndrome is a condition where the body can’t control or restrain an immune response, so the person’s immune cells attack their own healthy tissue. This leads to the development of Type 1 diabetes, severe eczema, damage to the small intestines and kidneys and failure to thrive. It’s diagnosed in infancy, most of those affected are boys, and it is often fatal.
Taylor Lookofsky (who has IPEX syndrome) and his father Brian
IPEX is one of two dozen rare diseases that CIRM is funding a clinical trial for. In fact, more than one third of all the projects we fund target a rare disease or condition. Those include:
Some might question the wisdom of investing hundreds of millions of dollars in conditions that affect a relatively small number of patients. But if you see the faces of these patients and get to know their families, as we do, you know that often agencies like CIRM are their only hope.
Dr. Maria Millan, CIRM’s President and CEO, says the benefits of one successful approach can often extend far beyond one rare disease.
“Children with IPEX syndrome clearly represent a group of patients with an unmet medical need, and this therapy could make a huge difference in their lives. Success of this treatment in this rare disease presents far-reaching potential to develop treatments for a larger number of patients with a broad array of immune disorders.”
CIRM is proud to fund and spread awareness of rare diseases and invites you to watch this video about how they affect families around the world.
Dr. Rosa Bacchetta on the right with Brian Lookofsky (left) and Taylor Lookofsky after CIRM funded Dr. Bacchetta’s work in October 2019. Taylor has IPEX syndrome
It’s always lovely to end the week on a bright note and that’s certainly the case this week, thanks to some encouraging news about CIRM-funded research targeting blood disorders that affect the immune system.
Stanford’s Dr. Rosa Bacchetta and her team learned that their proposed therapy for IPEX Syndrome had been given the go-ahead by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to test it in people in a Phase 1 clinical trial.
IPEX Syndrome (it’s more formal and tongue twisting name is Immune dysregulation Polyendocrinopathy Enteropathy X-linked syndrome) is a life-threatening disorder that affects children. It’s caused by a mutation in the FOXP3 gene. Immune cells called regulatory T Cells normally function to protect tissues from damage but in patients with IPEX syndrome, lack of functional Tregs render the body’s own tissues and organs to autoimmune attack that could be fatal in early childhood.
Current treatment options include a bone marrow transplant which is limited by available donors and graft versus host disease and immune suppressive drugs that are only partially effective. Dr. Rosa Bacchetta and her team at Stanford will use gene therapy to insert a normal version of the FOXP3 gene into the patient’s own T Cells to restore the normal function of regulatory T Cells.
This approach has already been accorded an orphan drug and rare pediatric disease designation by the FDA (we blogged about it last year)
Orphan drug designation is a special status given by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for potential treatments of rare diseases that affect fewer than 200,000 in the U.S. This type of status can significantly help advance treatments for rare diseases by providing financial incentives in the form of tax credits towards the cost of clinical trials and prescription drug user fee waivers.
Under the FDA’s rare pediatric disease designation program, the FDA may grant priority review to Dr. Bacchetta if this treatment eventually receives FDA approval. The FDA defines a rare pediatric disease as a serious or life-threatening disease in which the serious or life-threatening manifestations primarily affect individuals aged from birth to 18 years and affects fewer than 200,000 people in the U.S.
Congratulations to the team and we wish them luck as they begin the trial.
Dr. Donald Kohn, Photo courtesy UCLA
Someone who needs no introduction to regular readers of this blog is UCLA’s Dr. Don Kohn. A recent study in the New England Journal of Medicine highlighted how his work in developing a treatment for severe combined immune deficiency (SCID) has helped save the lives of dozens of children.
Now a new study in the journal Blood shows that those benefits are long-lasting, with 90% of patients who received the treatment eight to 11 years ago still disease-free.
In a news release Dr. Kohn said: “What we saw in the first few years was that this therapy worked, and now we’re able to say that it not only works, but it works for more than 10 years. We hope someday we’ll be able to say that these results last for 80 years.”
Ten children received the treatment between 2009 and 2012. Nine were babies or very young children, one was 15 years old at the time. That teenager was the only one who didn’t see their immune system restored. Dr. Kohn says this suggests that the therapy is most effective in younger children.
Dr. Kohn has since modified the approach his team uses and has seen even more impressive and, we hope, equally long-lasting results.
Darren Bidulka rests after his modified blood stem cells were transplanted into him at the Foothills Medical Centre in Calgary in 2017, allowing him to stop his enzyme therapy. (From left): Dr. Jeffrey Medin, Medical College of Wisconsin, Dr. Aneal Khan, the experimental trial lead in Calgary, and Darren Bidulka. Image Credit: Darren Bidulka
Fabry disease is an X-linked genetic disorder that can damage major organs and shorten lifespan. Without a functional version of a gene called GLA, our bodies are unable to make the correct version of an enzyme that breaks down a fat, and that in turn can lead to problems in the kidneys, heart and brain. It is estimated that one person in 40,000 to 60,000 has the disease and it affects men more severely than women since men only have one copy of the X chromosome. Current treatment consists of enzyme therapy infusions every two weeks but there is currently no cure for Fabry disease.
However, a Canadian research team is conducting the world’s first pilot study to treat Fabry disease using a stem cell gene therapy approach. The researchers collected the patient’s own blood stem cells and used gene therapy to insert copies of the fully functional gene into the stem cells, allowing them to make the correct version of the enzyme. The newly modified stem cells were then transplanted back into each patient.
Five men participated in this trial and the results so far have been very encouraging. After treatment with the stem cell gene therapy, all patients began producing the corrected version of the enzyme to near normal levels within one week. With these initial results, all five patients were allowed to stop their biweekly enzyme therapy infusions. So far, only three patients decided to do so and are stable.
In a news release, Darren Bidulka, the first patient to be treated in the study, talked about how life changing this stem cell gene therapy has been for him.
“I’m really happy that this worked. What an amazing result in an utterly fascinating experience. I consider this a great success. I can lead a more normal life now without scheduling enzyme therapy every two weeks. This research is also incredibly important for many patients all over the world, who will benefit from these findings.”
Jasper Therapeutics, Inc., a biotechnology company focused on blood stem cell therapies, and Graphite Bio, Inc., a biotechnology company focused on gene editing therapies to treat or cure serious diseases, announced a research and clinical collaboration for a treatment for X-SCID.
X-SCID, which stands for X-linked severe combined immunodeficiency, is a genetic disorder that interferes with the normal development of the immune system, leaving infants vulnerable to infections that most people can easily fight off. One treatment for X-SCID involves a blood stem cell transplant, in which the patient’s defective stem cells are wiped out with chemotherapy or radiation to make room for normal blood stem cells to take their place. Unfortunately, the problem with chemotherapy or radiation in young infants is that it can lead to lifelong effects such as neurological impairment, growth delays, infertility, and risk of cancer.
Fortunately, Jasper Therapeutics has developed JSP191, a non-toxic alternative to chemotherapy and radiation. It is an antibody that works by targeting and removing the defective blood forming stem cells. The approach has previously been used in a CIRM-funded clinical trial ($20M award) for X-SCID.
Graphite Bio has developed GPH201, the first-in-human investigational blood stem cell treatment that will be evaluated as a potential cure for patients suffering from X-SCID. GPH201 is generated using precise and efficient gene editing technology, It works by directly replacing a defective gene that causes problems with the immune system. The hope is that GPH201 will ultimately lead to the production of fully functional, healthy immune cells.
The ultimate goal of this collaboration is to use JSP191 as the non-toxic alternative to chemotherapy in patients in order to remove their defective blood stem cells. After that, the gene editing blood stem cell technology developed by Graphite Bio can be introduced to patients in order to treat X-SCID. The two companies have agreed to collaborate on research, and potentially a clinical study, evaluating JSP191 as the non-toxic conditioning agent for GPH201.
In a press release, Josh Lehrer, M.Phil., M.D., chief executive officer at Graphite Bio, expressed excitement about the collaboration between the two companies.
“This collaboration with Jasper demonstrates our shared commitment to pioneering novel therapeutic approaches with the potential to significantly improve the treatment experiences of individuals with devastating conditions who stand to benefit from gene replacement therapies, initially for patients with XSCID. GPH201 harnesses our targeted gene integration platform to precisely target the defective gene that causes XSCID and replace it with a normal copy.”
In the same press release, Bill Lis, executive chairman and CEO of Jasper Therapeutics, also expressed optimism in regards to the two companies teaming up.
“Our collaboration with Graphite Bio is an exciting opportunity to further advance the field of curative gene correction by combining a targeted gene integration platform with our first-in-class targeted CD117 antibody, JSP191, that has already demonstrated preliminary clinical efficacy and safety as a conditioning agent in X-SCID patients and those with blood cancers undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant.”
Graphite Bio is also developing gene editing technology to help treat sickle cell disease. It is currently supported by a CIRM late stage preclinical grant ($4.8M award). Th goal is to complete the final preclinical studies, which will allow Graphite Bio to start clinical studies of the sickle cell disease gene therapy in sickle cell patients in 2021.
Gaurav Shah, M.D., CEO and President of Rocket Pharmaceuticals
Leukocyte Adhesion Deficiency-I (LAD-I) is a rare pediatric disease caused by a mutation in a specific gene that causes low levels of a protein called CD18. Due to low levels of CD18, the adhesion of immune cells is affected, which negatively impacts the body’s ability to combat infections.
Rocket Pharmaceuticals is conducting a CIRM-funded ($6.56 M) clinical trial that is testing a treatment that uses a gene therapy called RP-L201. The therapy uses a patient’s own blood stem cells and inserts a functional version of the gene. These modified stem cells are then reintroduced back into the patient. The goal is to establish functional immune cells, enabling the body to combat infections. Previous studies have indicated that an increase in CD18 to 4-10% is associated with survival into adulthood.
The company presented interim data from the trial at the 62nd American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting in the form of an oral presentation. The data presented is from three pediatric patients with severe LAD-I, which is defined by CD18 expression of less than 2%. The patients were all treated with RP-L201. Patient One was 9-years of age at enrollment and had been followed for 12-months as of a cutoff date of November 2020. Patient Two was 3-years of age at enrollment and had been followed for over 6-months. Patient Three was 7-months of age at enrollment and was recently treated with RP-L201.
Key highlights from the presentation include:
RP-L201 was well tolerated, no safety issues reported with infusion or post-treatment
All patients achieved hematopoietic (blood) reconstitution within 5-weeks
12 months post-treatment, Patient One demonstrated durable CD18 expression of approximately 40%,
6-months post-treatment, Patient Two demonstrated CD18 expression of 23%
2-months post-treatment, Patient Three demonstrated CD18 expression of 76%
In a press release from Rocket, Gaurav Shah, M.D., CEO and President of Rocket, expressed excitement about these results.
“…we continue to see encouraging evidence of efficacy for RP-L201 for the treatment of LAD-I. Patients have shown sustained CD18 expression of 23% to 40%, far exceeding the 4-10% threshold associated with survival into adulthood…”
To view the presentations at the conclusion of the oral presentation, click the link here.
The Stem Cellar 