CELL AND GENE THERAPY, INDUSTRIAL IMPACT
Evaxion | February 10, 2023
Evaxion Biotech A/S, a clinical-phase biotech company specializing in enhancing AI-powered immunotherapies, and Pantherna Therapeutics GmbH, a biopharmaceutical company developing enhanced nanoparticle solutions for delivering and expressing mRNA therapeutics, announced a preclinical proof of concept for the combination of their key technologies.
Using Pantherna's unique lipid nanoparticle mRNA technology (PTXLNP®, PTXmRNA®), tumor neoantigens discovered by Evaxion's artificial intelligence (AI) platform drive a robust immune response and completely limit tumor development in a preclinical model.
Birgitte Rønø, CSO at Evaxion, said, “We are extremely pleased with the preclinical data that clearly demonstrate the potential for our combined technologies. The data provide further evidence that immunogenic sequences identified by Evaxion’s AI platforms are able to drive a relevant immune response on multiple vaccine platforms, including mRNA. This opens up many opportunities in our current and future immuno-oncology and infectious disease programs.”
(Source – GlobeNewswire)
CEO at Pantherna, Klaus Giese, stated, “We are encouraged by the data and see an enormous potential of combining Evaxion’s AI-based antigen discovery engines with our state-of-the-art mRNA-LNP platforms. The preclinical data substantiate the relevance of enhancing the efficiency of mRNA actions in the body and validates the ability of our platform to induce an immune response.”
(Source – GlobeNewswire)
Evaxion and Pantherna will continue investigating optimum LNP formulations for the efficient delivery of mRNA- and DNA-encoded antigens found by Evaxion's AI systems.
About Evaxion
Evaxion Biotech A/S is a clinical-stage biotech firm working on AI-powered immunotherapies. Evaxion's patented and scalable artificial intelligence algorithms decode the human immune system to find and develop innovative immunotherapies for cancer, bacterial illnesses, and viral infections. It is developing a diverse pipeline of innovative product candidates, including three tailored cancer immunotherapies. It is listed on the Nasdaq New York Stock Exchange and is headquartered in Hørsholm, Denmark.
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INDUSTRIAL IMPACT, MEDICAL
Twist Bioscience | March 10, 2023
On March 9, 2023, Twist Bioscience Corporation, a leading firm providing high-quality synthetic DNA through its silicon platform, announced the launch of integrated antibody discovery services. This premium offering combines the company's synthetic libraries and AI machine learning with an in vivo immunization approach acquired through its acquisition of Abveris, also known as Twist Boston. This service provides customers with optimized, development-ready antibody candidates.
The combined team, now called Twist Biopharma Solutions, is led by Tracey Mullen, MBA, the senior vice president of biopharma for Twist Bioscience. This newly formed entity leverages years of industry expertise, scientific excellence, and proprietary technology to discover the best antibody candidate for therapeutic targets of interest.
Twist Biopharma Solutions offers an end-to-end workflow for centralized antibody discovery and optimization, including target validation, hit generation, lead selection, lead optimization, and lead characterization. Twist, supported by high-throughput DNA synthesis and IgG antibody production, constructs extensive and particular synthetic antibody libraries with discovery starting with either in vivo or in vitro diversity.
The newly integrated in vivo discovery approach from Abveris of single B cell screening and hybridoma discovery enables parallel paths where multiple technology methods can be leveraged to build a panel of highly diverse antibody leads with broad epitope coverage. In addition, this multi-pronged approach can increase the likelihood of discovering highly specific, high-affinity functional antibodies by sampling synthetic and natural diversity.
The South San Francisco and Boston biopharma teams were combined to create Twist Biopharma Solutions, led by Tracey Mullen. Aaron Sato, Ph.D., remains integrally involved in Twist Biopharma Solutions and, as a chief scientific officer of Twist Bioscience, extends his expertise across the organization. Tracey Mullen joined Twist Bioscience in November 2021 through the acquisition of Abveris. In April 2022, she took on the position of senior vice president of operations, driving the completion of the Factory of the Future in Wilsonville, Oregon, which began shipping products in January 2023. Before joining Twist, she served as CEO of Abveris and worked on the antibody discovery team at Biogen.
About Twist Bioscience
Twist Bioscience is a leading biotechnology company specializing in synthetic biology and genomics. It has developed a proprietary DNA synthesis platform that enables the production of custom-designed DNA strands faster, more accurately, and at a lower cost than traditional methods. In addition, Twist collaborates with partners across industries to develop customized DNA sequences for specific applications and offers a range of other products and services, such as oligonucleotides, synthetic genes, and custom panels for next-generation sequencing. The company has also developed a library of over 100 billion synthetic antibodies, which can be used for diagnostic and therapeutic applications.
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AI
Benchling | January 27, 2023
On January 27, 2023, Benchling, the R&D cloud that powers the biotechnology sector, announced that it has passed the System and Organization Controls (SOC) 2 certification. Schellman, an independent Certified Public Accounting (CPA) firm, conducted the Type 2 SOC 2 test according to the AICPA's SOC 2 standards.
Type 2 SOC 2 evaluates the design and operational performance of an organization's security processes and controls to meet its security goals and customer commitments during a predetermined evaluation period. Constant monitoring, evaluation, and modification of the requirements and security measures guarantee a secure environment for doing business.
The CISO at Benchling, Zach Powers, said, "Biotechs are managing an evolving landscape of security and compliance risks, and they require trusted software partners to help them meet these demands." He added, "At Benchling, we make the security, privacy, and compliance of our customers' sensitive data a company-wide, critical investment, not only through Type 2 SOC 2, but also through our best-in-class security team, our trust-but-verify processes, and our adherence to global compliance standards."
(Source – PR Newswire)
Benchling's R&D Cloud is the biotech R&D platform of choice, trusted by over 1,000 organizations worldwide in highly regulated areas such as biopharmaceuticals, agribusiness, industrials, and consumer packaged goods. Benchling is used by customers to securely store, standardize, and analyze crucial data related to the design and development of innovative biotech products. Benchling's objective is to protect client data; hence, the firm utilizes sophisticated data security and privacy protections and complies with tight regulatory regulations such as the NIST Cybersecurity Framework. The organization is also ISO 27001 certified.
The successful completion of Benchling's Type 2 SOC 2 inspection assures that its biotech clients can conduct crucial R&D work in the Benchling R&D Cloud while following the highest security requirements.
About Benchling
Benchling is a San Francisco-based firm that focuses on private and public life science cooperation by developing cloud-based software tools for digital DNA sequence editing, planning and performing experiments, evaluating data, and sharing research. More than 200,000 scientists from over 1,000 firms and 7,500 university and research institutions worldwide have used the Benchling R&D Cloud to create breakthrough discoveries and deliver the next generation of medicines, foods, and materials to market more quickly. In addition, the R&D cloud assists these companies in modernizing their scientific processes and accelerating their cooperation to transform the complexity of biology into world-changing outcomes.
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