Most patients with acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) can only be cured when a stem cell transplant induces an immune response against the patient’s leukaemia.

Working with patients who are in remission from AML, we discovered antibodies that bind specifically to AML cells.

We suspect that these antibodies have general utility in treating other patients with AML.

The target of these antibodies was unanticipated: the U5 snRNP200 protein complex, normally expressed in the cell cytoplasm and nucleus but expressed on the outer surface of AML cells.

Moreover, we found that U5 specific antibodies are ‘killer antibodies’: they kill AML blasts in vitro and (in a mouse model) in vivo.

We are now advancing these antibodies through early development with the goal of initiating human clinical trials in the near future.

See also the infographic (dutch) at here.

Source: EHA