DNA vaccine for cancers expressing hTERT

Preclinical Cancer therapeutic

Milestone None

Description
Human Telomerase Reverse Transcriptase (hTERT) is an attractive DNA vaccine target in cancer immunotherapy.  High levels of hTERT have been detected in more than 85% of all human cancers, while normal cells showed undetectable levels of telomerase expression. Immunological analysis indicated that the hTERT is a widely applicable target recognized by T cells and can be potentially used as a universal cancer vaccine. Inovio has developed a highly optimized synthetic hTERT DNA vaccine designed to target multiple cancers expressing the antigen hTERT, including non-small cell lung carcinoma, breast cancer, melanoma, and prostate cancer. When delivered by electroporation, the vaccine induced strong and broad hTERT-specific CD8+ T cell immune responses in rodents and in non-human primates. 

Development Status
The hTERT DNA vaccine has induced strong and broad hTERT-specific CD8+ T cell immune responses in rodents and non-human primates in preclinical studies.

Disease State
Approximately 690,000 new cases in aggregate of breast, non-small cell lung and prostate cancers will be diagnosed each year in the U.S. alone. Despite currently available treatments, 228,000 people die of these cancers in the U.S. each year.

¹Data compiled from American Cancer Society, Inc., Cancer Facts and Figures 2012 and Surveillance Research: Leading New Cancer Cases and Deaths – 2012 Estimates. Atlanta, GA: American Cancer Society, 2012.

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