THE JOURNEY TO THE ANTIBODY: ACCESSING A VERSATILE TOOLBOX

Transcription

1 THE JOURNEY TO THE ANTIBODY: ACCESSING A VERSATILE TOOLBOX Daniela Teixeira 4 th BIOLOGICS BIOSIMILARS CONGRESS, 5 th March 2018

2 FairJourney Biologics Paramount Quality Reliability Expertise Valued Partnered Fully Integrated Antibody Discovery company founded upon Paramount Quality and Science Well-established as a Leader in Antibody Discovery Partnered with several biotech and pharma companies to systematically explore Groundbreaking Novel Targets and Creating New Ventures

3 FairJourney Biologics (FJB) Corporate Snapshot Our Core Values are High Quality in Our Workflow Systems and Excellence in Our Science Founded in 2012 by António Parada (ex-ablynx) and Maria Pajuelo (ex-ablynx) Privately held company, profitable since 2013 FairJourney Biologics partnered with more than 49 companies including large pharmaceutical companies, small biotech businesses and universities 3

4 Core Competence in Antibody Discovery 60 Employees HIGHLY EXPERIENCED LEADERSHIP TEAM Combined experience and expertise in the antibody field of more than 70 years o23 PhD o30 Master o5 Bachelor Team of 43 people dedicated to R&D Team of 8 people dedicated to Biomanufacturing Capacity ENGAGED IN MORE THAN 180 PROJECTS o52 Projects ongoing in parallel o6 FTE-based multiyear contracts (from 2 to 12 FTEs per partner) 3200 m 2 Facility STATE OF THE ART FACILITIES WITH FURTHER EXPANSION ONGOING Quality-oriented lab layout o 10 Dedicated Phage labs o 4 Dedicated Library construction labs o 2 Mammalian cell culture and mammalian screening lab o 4 Screening labs o 2 Molecular Biology labs o 3 Dedicated mammalian protein production labs o 2 Dedicated bacterial protein production labs 4

5 Robust Discovery Capabilities Equipments Techniques Microplate Absorbance reader (Biotek) Absorbance-based assays (Binding, competition ELISA) Fluorescence based assays (i.e. AlphaScreen, Microplate Fluorometer and Luminometer reader AlphaELISA, HTRF ) (Fluoroskan, Thermo Scientific) Luminescence-based assays (i.e. DiscoveRx PathHunter Multi mode Plate reader (EnVision, PerkinElmer) assays) Flow Citometry analysis (Binding, competition, binning, Flow cytometers (BD Accuri C6, BD Biosciences and proliferation, internalization, cell signalling assays) Attune NxT, Thermo Scientific) Kinetics and affinity analysis SPR systems (Octet, FortéBio and Biacore, GE) ÄKTA pure and ÄKTA prime systems (GE) Affinity chromatography purification Size Exclusion chromatography (SEC) FcRn Affinity chromatography Polyreactivity assessment Stability assessment 5

6 Customized R&D Process Project Design Customer Relationship Project Delivery Extensive expertise and know-how Customization of project strategy oinvestment in work plan design ocustomer needs-driven ocustom development of assays Strong investment in communication with customer obuilt on trust and respect oregular contact with the dedicated project manager and lead scientist Paramount commitment for high quality oquality controls of systems, information and products Traceability and Confidentiality ohigh standards data recording Fast delivery Respect delivery timelines 6

7 Fast Delivery Timelines Services SERVICE TIMELINES FINAL DELIVERABLES Antibody Discovery Antibody Engineering Antibody Production Humanization Affinity maturation Sequence optimization 4-12 months 4-6 months 3-8 weeks Clone overview (Excel) V sequences Overview report (PPT) Purified antibodies (optional) Clone overview (Excel) V sequences Overview report (PPT) Purified antibodies (optional) Certificate of analysis Purified antibodies and sequences 7

8 Combining Phage Display With Diverse Libraries FJB TECHNOLOGY FJB ASSETS Phage Display Antibody libraries 8

9 Pushing The Boundaries Of Phage Display Triple Vector allows work to flow straightforward from research directly into mammalian expression in full therapeutic format eliminating the need to change the backbone of the plasmid thus saving much time and money Suitable for discovery of sdab and scfv fused to human Fc FJB triple vector Phage display of VHHhuFc molecules Time-saver as no subcloning needed in bacteria and mammalian expression vectors Production of soluble VHH-huFc molecules in bacteria periplasm for HTP screening Production of VHH-huFc molecules in mammalian cells for screening and characterization 9

10 Highly Diverse Library Capabilities IMMUNE LIBRARIES Healthy human donors NAÏVE LIBRARIES Non-immunized llamas Porto, Portugal Size: 5.0E+08 CFU Size: 2.6E+10 CFU Size: 2.0E+09 CFU > 980 Libraries generated at FJB 10

11 Our Phage Display Libraries IMMUNE LIBRARIES Rodent, rabbit, chicken and llama antibody libraries of specific antibodies Mouse, rat, chicken and rabbit Fab immune libraries Llama Fab, VHH and VHH-huFc immune libraries Recognition of multiple and diverse target classes Soluble proteins and membrane-associated proteins Complex membrane targets (GPCR and ion channels) Immuno-checkpoint modulators Viral proteins Non-protein molecules Different activities and applications Antagonist, agonists, conformation-specific states and neutralizing activities Size: 5.0E+08 CFU Specific for post-translation modifications i.e. phosphorylation Immunohistochemistry 11

12 Our Phage Display Libraries PBMCs from healthy donors (0.5 L of blood/donor) Fab format libraries All human germlines and IgG1 CH1, C and C amplified Per donor, kappa and lambda repertoires kept separated High-efficient two-step cloning into phagemid method to obtain large libraries Three libraries validated by isolating targets specific antibodies Library H002-H007 Library H014-H019 Library H020-H025 HUMAN FAB NAÏVE LIBRARIES Healthy human donors Size: 2.6E+10 CFU Porto, Portugal 12

13 High Diversity And Activity From Our Libraries Soluble and cell membrane-associated targets Binders, neutralizing and ligand-receptor blocking antibodies identified for human targets Cross-reactivity to other species targets Affinities of identified IgGs from pm to two-digit nm values HUMAN FAB NAÏVE LIBRARIES Healthy human donors Human IgGa Human IgGb Size: 2.6E+10 CFU 13

14 Our Phage Display Libraries PBLs from 8-11 non-immunized llamas VHH and VHH-huFc format libraries LLAMA VHH AND VHH-huFc NAÏVE LIBRARIES Soluble and cell membrane-associated targets Anti-human CXCR4 VHH and VHH-huFc EC50 values of nm CXCR4 ligand displacers No off-target (MPA Integral Molecular technology) Porto, Portugal Non-immunized llamas Size: 2.0E+09 CFU 14

15 Robust Antibody Engineering High-throughput engineering Phage display libraries containing billions of antibody CDR/FR mutants are interrogated in panning under specific conditions (i.e. affinity-driven selections, stability-driven selections) Phage display libraries in Fab format (monovalent display) Ranking of hundreds of variants by off-rate values or other parameters Delivery of humanized variants with human homology > 95 % with no loss of affinity Affinity increases of matured variants from fold over parental antibody Size: 1-10E+09 CFU Annealing mutagenic oligos/ Trimers 15

16 Full Antibody And Protein Production Capabilities Recombinant expression of antibody fragments in bacterial systems Recombinant expression of antibody and antibody fragments in mammalian systems o IgG, single-armed IgG, Fab, Fab(2), sdab-fc, sdab o Bispecific antibodies o Multiple species, isotypes, allotypes, Fc effector mutants o Transient expression yields of up to 1 g/litre ExpiCHO-S system o Delivery of product with > 95 % purity and Endotoxin levels below 1 EU/ml Production of Fc fusion proteins and other proteins to be used as immunogens in mammalian and insect cells systems Custom design and generation of expression vectors 16

17 Case Study 1: Anti-Mesothelin Antibodies Targeting Selectively The Membrane-associated Form The NEED: Identification of IgGs recognizing the membrane bound but not the soluble form of mesothelin. The SOLUTION: Subtractive mice immunization Mouse immune Fab phage display libraries Cell-based phage display selections Cell-based binding and competition screening Publication: Kamal et al. (2017) MABS 9,

18 Case Study 1: Anti-Mesothelin Antibodies Targeting Selectively The Membrane-associated Form The RESULT: Identification of a panel of mouse Fabs recognizing the membrane bound but not the soluble form of mesothelin. Binding FACS on CHO cells transfected with human mesothelin and on CHO WT cells using P.E. produced from clones selected from mouse immune Fab libraries CHO WT CHO-Mesothelin CHO-Mesothelin + Soluble Mesothelin Example of cell and soluble Fab binder (01D02) Example of cellspecific Fab binder (01D08) Publication: Kamal et al. (2017) MABs 9,

19 Case Study 2: Isolation Of Anti-Receptor X Human Antibodies From Human Naïve Fab Library The NEED: Identification of human IgGs recognizing the human receptor X in an activated form. The SOLUTION: Human Naïve Fab phage display libraries Cell-based phage display panning Cell-based binding screening 19

20 Case Study 2: Isolation Of Anti-Receptor X Human Antibodies From Human Naïve Fab Library The RESULT: Isolation of a diverse panel of human Fabs recognizing the human receptor X in the activated form selected for formatting to IgG for functional characterization. Binding FACS on cells expressing the human receptor X activated and on non-expressing cells using Phage and P.E. produced from clones selected from human naïve Fab libraries Cell binding Phage FACS Cell binding P.E. FACS Non-expressing cells Cells expressing Receptor X Non-expressing cells Cells expressing Receptor X Cell type 1 Cell type 2 Cell type 1 Cell type 2 Phage (03C05 ) P.E. (03C05 ) Phage (12C07 ) P.E. (12C07 ) 20

21 Case Study 3: Affinity Maturation Of A Human Monoclonal Antibody The NEED: Affinity maturation of a human monoclonal antibody (MAB) by screening of designed variants via phage display. Affinity improvement from 22 nm to mid pm The SOLUTION: Rationale design of variants based on crystal structure of complex: Key positions of heavy and light chain V domains mutated to specific amino acids Design of variants by fully randomization based on crystal structure of complex: Heavy chain V domain hot spot residues fully randomized to all 20 amino acids using NNK codons Generation of variants by Light chain shuffling approach: Light chain V domain substituted by VL domains from FJB human naïve libraries Affinity maturation Fab phage display libraries Affinity-driven phage display selections Specificity and Offrate ranking IgG formatting and Affinity assessment 21

22 Case Study 3: Affinity Maturation Of A Human Monoclonal Antibody The RESULT: Identification of human MAB variants with 8.5 to 55 fold affinity gain in comparison with the parental MAB. Affinity assessment of affinity matured variants in Biacore Parental MAB (KD= 22 nm) Affinity matured MAB from randomization (KD= 0.4 nm) Affinity matured MAB from Light chain shuffling (KD= 2.6 nm) 22

23 Case Study 4_Single-Armed Antibody Production The NEED: Production of 500 mg of a humanized single-armed IgG to be tested in vivo. The SOLUTION: Cloning of synthetic genes in mammalian expression vectors using knob-into-hole technology Transient transfection in ExpiCHO system Protein A purification + SEC purification SDS-PAGE + SEC analysis + LPS quantification QC Expression of human IgG1 single-armed antibody in CHO cells and ÄKTA pure Protein A plus SEC purification (productivity in transient expression of 350 mg/l) SEC Purification SDS-PAGE QC Analytical SEC Non-reduced Reduced Monovalen IgG Heavy chain Truncated heavy chain Light chain 520 mg of smab delivered with > 95 % purity and Endotoxin levels < 1 EU/ml 23

24 Working With FairJourney Biologics Phage Display Technology & FJB Antibody libraries Fee-for-service projects Co-development projects Pipeline Customers retain full IP rights No royalties Back-loaded agreements Percentage of IP Shares in new ventures 24

25 Co-development And Pipeline Programs TARGET CLASS CLINICAL INDICATION STAGE Heparanase Enzyme Oncology Characterization IL-7Rα Membrane protein Oncology Characterization Target 1 Membrane protein Oncology Early discovery Target 2 Soluble protein Oncology Early discovery Target 3 Membrane protein Oncology Early discovery CXCR4 GPCR Oncology/ Inflammation Characterization Target 4 Soluble protein Inflammation Characterization 25

26 Contact Us Our center of research excellence is located in Porto, Portugal, in the heart of biologics research and innovation. We maintain a tremendously cost-effective structure in our operations and thus affordability on behalf of our clients. Rua do Campo Alegre Porto PORTUGAL T : info@fjb.pt Porto, Portugal 26