Pancreatic cancer is heavy! PD-L1 and CD16 dual-specific NK cell therapy PD-L1 t-haNK showed strong results: 1x increase in total lifetime!

January 18, 2021 // -- NantKwest is a pioneering immunotherapy company focused on the use of natural killer cells (NK) to treat cancer, infectious diseases, inflammatory diseases, and congenital immune system diseases.
, the company, in a joint report with ImmunityBio, another immunotherapy company, released early interim results of the PD-L1 t-haNK trial.
data show that in patients with advanced metastatic pancreatic cancer who do not have other FDA-approved treatment options, the average survival rate of PD-L1 t-haNK combination therapy is twice the historical survival rate.
these trials, based on the initial Cancer Moonshot guess and the exploratory QULT trial launched in 2017, seem to validate a theory that by coordinating NK and T cell therapies, survival rates can be improved without the need for large doses of chemotherapy.
early cancer moon landing trial involved a combination of cell therapy and immunotherapy from a number of biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, including Nat Kwest, ImmunityBio, NewKie and Pfizer.
these trials explore the hypothesis that by activating the patient's own immune system, changes in the pattern of cancer treatment may evolve to eliminate cancer cells without the need for large doses of chemotherapy.
From 2017 to 2020, several QUILT clinical trials exploring these combinations of cell therapy, immunomodulating antibodies, adenovirus-based cancer vaccines, and low-dose chemotherapy provide preliminary results that show that in patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer who do not have other FDA-approved treatments, the average survival rate can be more than doubled and can be fully alleviated.
based on data from these trials, ImmunityBio is conducting a key 3-queue clinical trial (QUILT88) in metastatic pancreatic cancer.
PD-L1 t-haNK cell is a human-derived allogeneic NK cell line that is engineered to express the chimic antigen subject (CAR) that targets PD-L1 and originated in The NatKwest's proprietary NK-92 (aNK) main cell bank.
In addition to targeting PD-L1, PD-L1.t-haNK is also an affinity variant of the engineered expression CD16 subject (V158 Fc-RIIIa), which promotes the removal of cancer cells by attaching to monoclonal antibodies previously bindned to cancer cells to mediate antibody-dependent cytotoxicity (ADCC).
This means that the therapy can be used in combination with other targeted methods on December 21, 2020, ImmunityBio signed a merger agreement with NantKwest, which is expected to be completed in the first half of 2021 and will create a leading immunotherapy and cell therapy company focused on oncology and infectious diseases.
The results of the interim study published here are as follows: In the 2019 trial of the cancer ion QUILT, which was completed with haNK's joint PD-L1 inhibitor avelumab, the total survival of the medium was more than doubled (middle OS: 8 months vs 3 months (historical control group).
When PD-L1 t-haNK was used instead of haNK and PD-L1 inhibitors avelumab, 1 patient received complete remission, 4 out of 5 patients survived 8-16 months after the start of treatment with these expansion options, and the mesos were still not reached.
launched a one-arm Phase 2 trial (QUILT 88, Queue C) in October 2020, with a total lifetime (OS) and 15 (83%) of the 18 second- or multi-line pancreatic cancer patients in the group are still alive.
Phase 2 randomized trials (QUILT 88, Queue A and Queue B) for first- and second-line metastatic pancreatic cancer are still actively grouped at 3 clinical sites.
Dr Patrick Soon Shiong, Chairman and CEO of ImmunityBio, said: "The goal of the Cancer Moon Landing Project is to explore the hypothesis that by coordinating natural killer cells and T-cells, there may be a change in the pattern of cancer treatment.
the preliminary results of these cancer ionization trials, which combine immunotherapic molecules including Abraxane from New Base, HaNK from Nat Kwest, Anktiva from ImmunityBio, and PD-L1 inhibitor avelumab from Pfizer, provide promising early data showing that the meso-total survival of patients with advanced metastatic diseases of multiple tumor types is likely to double.
" Patrick Soon Shiong, M.D., added, "For five patients who did not have other treatment options, we replaced haNK and avelumab with NK cell therapy PD-L1 t-haNK, and were pleased to observe the first patient to receive this combination therapy in complete remission."
, four out of five of these patients are still alive after starting treatment.
these observations confirm our hypothesis that activating a patient's own immune system with low-dose chemotherapy can improve prognosis.
based on our initial research, we started a randomized trial of QULT 99 metastatic pancreatic cancer, and today we are pleased to present these findings, including survival data for queue C.
although this data is still early, the doubling of the total lifetime is encouraging and deserves further research.
": Nant Kwest, ImmunityBio Announce Positive Interim Data on Survival Rates in Metastatic Pancreatic Cancer Trials