Completed Digestion, Kidneys & Other Organs Infection & Immunity

Pre-Clinical Development of a Novel Therapeutic Vaccine for Chronic Hepatitis B

Funder InnovateUK (part of UKRI)
Recipient organisation Altimmune UK Limited
Funding £2.0M
Period Mar 2013 — Dec 2014

In plain English

AI plain-English summary

Around 14 million people in Europe live with chronic hepatitis B, and nearly a quarter of them will die from liver failure or liver cancer caused by the virus—over 36,000 deaths each year. Current treatments suppress the virus but rarely clear it, meaning patients often need lifelong, costly drug therapy. The company Immune Targeting Systems is developing a vaccine called Hepsyn-B that aims to train the immune system to recognise and eliminate infected liver cells, rather than just controlling the virus. This is a fundamentally different approach: a therapeutic vaccine, not a preventative one. If the vaccine proves safe and effective in pre-clinical testing, it could reduce the need for prolonged drug treatment, lower the burden on healthcare systems, and cut the indirect costs of lost productivity and premature death. Success would move Hepsyn-B toward human clinical trials, offering a potential path to functional cure for a disease that currently has none.

View original technical description
In Europe there are an estimated 14 million citizens living with chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, nearly a quarter of those will die of liver failure or liver cancer as a direct result of the viral infection, accounting for >36,000 deaths per annum. As a consequence HBV is a significant burden to healthcare systems across Europe through the direct costs of treatment, as well as indirect costs linked to lost productivity and premature death. Immune Targeting Systems (ITS) is developing a novel fluoropeptide vaccine immunotherapy (Hepsyn-B), based on its proprietary Depovaccine and Densigen technologies, to induce immune control over the disease, increase likelihood of the clearance of infected liver cells and reducing the need for prolonged costly drug therapy. This project provides the opportunity to expedite the pre-clinical development of Hepsyn-B and demonstrate vaccine safety, efficacy and manufacturability in preparation for human clinical trials.

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Related Research

Grants with similar aims, by meaning.

Overcoming immunotolerance in chronic viral hepatitis with lentivector vaccine immunotherapy.
HepTcell - Phase 2, Double-blind, Randomized, Placebo-controlled Study of HepTcell (Adjuvanted FP-02.2) as an Immunotherapeutic Vaccine in Treatment-naïve Patients with Inactive Chronic Hepatitis B (CHB) ALT-301-202
Thervacb: A therapeutic vaccine to cure hepatitis b
Redirecting T cells to overcome tolerance in chronic HBV infection
Bim-mediated attrition of virus-specific CD8 T cells in chronic HBV infection

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