Glycostem technology is awarded research grant

December 2018 - Together with Enpicom Glycostem has been awarded funding to develop cancer prediction tool for an area without standard therapy.

Today, two innovative Dutch SME's active in Life Sciences, Glycostem Therapeutics BV and ENPICOM BV,announced that their joint MITZuid R&D partnership subsidy has been granted.The aim of the collaboration is to develop technology to predict the outcome of an NK-cell-based immunotherapy treatment in patients with incurable locally advanced or metastatic solid tumors, for which there is no standard therapy.

Background problem

The predictabilityof outcomes of universal NK-cell therapy (oNKord®) and immune suppressive effects are needed to select the best approach in a new immunotherapy against cancer.

Project goals

The primary goal is predicting the outcome of an NK-cell-based immunotherapy treatment in patients with incurable locally advanced or metastatic solid tumors, for which there is no standard therapy.The integrated T-cell receptor and NK-cell receptor repertoire analysis developed in this project enables the development of a unique data-driven combination therapy that provides:

  • A new  immune  suppression  regimen  in  combination  with  allogeneic  NK-cell  therapy  for  the treatment of multiple cancer types
  • An integrated model based on machine learning to predict smart treatment of immune suppression and the outcome of subsequent NK-cell therapy.

Approach & deliverables

A smart machine learning driven approach is needed. Jan Spanholtz, PhD, GlycostemTherapeutics BV’s CSO, commented: “That is why ENPICOM BV, a promising start-up with leading technology for analysis and  visualisation  of  immunogenomic  data,  and  Glycostem  have  joined forces.This  R&D  collaboration enables predictive modelling for smart immune suppression as preconditioning to allow allogeneic NK-cell  infusion  as  cancer  treatment.  Glycostem  adds  specific  immunotherapy  knowledge  to  the  project. ENPICOM introduces leading knowledge and experience in bioinformatics and software engineering.

Jos  Lunenberg,  CEO  of ENPICOM,  added: “We are extremely pleased with this R&D partnership,  as  it enables us to broaden the scope of immunotherapies that we can guide with our technology from Tand B cell-based to NK-cell-based therapies. Glycostem, a pioneer and expert in this field, is for us the ideal partner to adapt our technology to also support NK-cell receptor repertoire analysis”