Takara Bio Inc. has entered a licensing agreement with MOLMED, that wanted to use Takara Bio's proprietary recombinant protein, RetroNectin^®, for a clinical application of gene therapy. In terms of the agreement, MOLMED can non-exclusively use the protein for clinical development of its gene therapy programs.

RetroNectin^® is a recombinant protein CH-296, a fragment of fibronectin, which was found to stimulate gene transfer into hematopoietic stem cells via recombinant retrovirus vectors. So far, clinical studies of gene therapy using the protein in combination with retrovirus vectors have been performed in 22 medical institutes in the world. The protocol was originally developed by researchers at Indiana University and Takara Bio.

MOLMED is a venture company majoring in gene therapy development and carrying out clinical trials in which combination of Herpes Simplex Virus (HSV) tymidine kinase and ganciclovir is used to treat patients suffering from leukemia. Successful combination of HSV-tk and ganciclovir in gene therapy permits to control the side effects of bone marrow transplantation, allowing to fight cancer cells and to reconstitute the patient's immune system in a safe way. This method was developed by Dr. Claudio Bordignon, President of MOLMED. In addition, its pipeline of development contains gene therapy programs for lung and prostate cancers, and AIDS. Within these programs, MOLMED has a plan to use Takara Bio's recombinant protein for the ex vivo treatment of lymphocytes and stem cells. Takara Bio expects that gene therapy protocols using RetroNectin^® could become more popular and help patients through clinical trials by MOLMED.

Takara Bio will supply MOLMED and the related institutes, such as San Raffaele Hospital in Milan, with GMP-grade RetroNectin^® for the development.

This article is translated from news in Japanese for your convenience.