Notch Therapeutics Scientific Co-Founder Recognized in Nature Communications Publication Describing the Company’s Foundational Technology for Generating T Cells from Renewable Sources
VANCOUVER, British Columbia, August 18, 2021— Notch Therapeutics, Inc., a biotechnology company developing renewable, induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived cell therapies for cancer, announced today a peer-reviewed publication describing a key aspect of the company’s proprietary Engineered Thymic Niche (ETN) platform. The study from the laboratory of Notch scientific co-founder Juan-Carlos Zúñiga-Pflücker, Ph.D., Chair and Professor in the Department of Immunology at the University of Toronto and Senior Scientist at the Sunnybrook Research Institute, entitled “DL4-µbeads Induce T-Cell Lineage Differentiation from Stem Cells in a Stromal Cell-Free System,” is published in the August 18, 2021 issue of Nature Communications.
In the Nature Communications publication, Drs. Zúñiga-Pflücker, Trotman-Grant, Mohtashami, and colleagues at the University of Toronto and Sunnybrook Research Institute present a bead-based system for generating T-lineage cells from multiple sources of stem cells using a serum- and animal component-free approach that is amenable to clinical use. The technology essentially mimics the environment of the human thymus, where T cells naturally differentiate in response to activation of the Notch signaling pathway. The process greatly simplifies manufacturing and has the potential to produce immune cells at scale without the use of feeder cell lines.
The Notch ETN is a robust and scalable platform for developing consistent, off-the-shelf T cell therapies from renewable stem cell sources. The platform offers the potential to make cell therapy mainstream by creating unlimited supplies of therapeutic cells from a single pluripotent cell that are readily available for delivery to the bedsides of thousands of patients.
“The ability to create renewable-source, off-the-shelf cell therapies with greater consistency and at industrial scale has long been the holy grail for making cell therapy more drug-like—meaning cells that are manufactured under highly controlled conditions with minimal variability in product, and in sufficient quantities to treat large numbers of patients,” said Peter Zandstra, Chief Scientific Officer and a co-founder of Notch. “Dr. Zuniga-Pflucker’s publication demonstrates three significant advantages: The approach obviates the need for feeder cells, enables precise control over the signaling that drives cell differentiation, and enables Notch to manufacture immune cells in large-scale bioreactors. We are combining this discovery with other proprietary technologies to further advance our platform.”
About Notch Therapeutics (www.notchtx.com)
Notch is developing a pipeline of cellular immunotherapies originating from pluripotent stem cells that are specifically engineered to address the underlying biology of complex disease systems. The company has unlocked the ability for large-quantity production of T cells and other cells from any source of stem cells to bring best-in-class cell therapies for cancer and other immune disorders to thousands of patients. The core of the Notch platform is the Engineered Thymic Niche (ETN), which enables precision control of cell fate during the differentiation and expansion of stem cells in suspension bioreactors without the need for feeder cells or serum. The ETN has the potential to generate immunotherapies with decreased variability, increased potency, and engineered improvements. The technology was invented in the laboratories of Juan-Carlos Zúñiga-Pflücker, Ph.D. at Sunnybrook Research Institute and Peter Zandstra, Ph.D., FRSC at the University of Toronto. Notch was founded by these two institutions, in conjunction with MaRS Innovation (now Toronto Innovation Acceleration Partners) and the Centre for Commercialization of Regenerative Medicine (CCRM), which initially incubated the company.
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