Zoom imageDr. Sylvestre Marillonnet has placed tobacco plants upside down in a vacuum tank filled with a bacterial solution. The bacteria transport genes into the plants, which can then produce medicinal active substances.
The transfer of a patient-specific vaccine into clinical development represents a milestone for Bayer Innovation GmbH. Following approval of the Phase I study by the FDA (Food & Drug Administration) in the United States, the vaccine is now being tested in human subjects. This marks the first time that proteins obtained from tobacco plants using magnICON® technology are undergoing clinical testing. The patient-specific vaccines produced in the pilot plant of Bayer subsidiary Icon Genetics in Halle, Germany, are intended for the treatment of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL), a type of cancer affecting lymphocytes. The objective of the therapy is to activate the patient’s immune system, enabling the malignant cells to be targeted and destroyed by the body’s own defense system.
“This personalized vaccine is being developed with the aim of keeping patients who have responded well to chemotherapy in complete remission – in other words, preventing a recurrence of the tumor,” explains Dr. Detlef Wollweber, Managing Director of Bayer Innovation GmbH. “The initiation of this clinical trial also demonstrates that our magnICON® technology is suitable for manufacturing proteins for potential pharmaceutical applications.”
The magnICON® technology is a new process for rapidly producing high yields of recombinant proteins, such as biopharmaceuticals, in tobacco plants. The plant is not genetically modified. The blueprint for the required product is inserted temporarily into the plant using a species of Agrobacterium and distributed throughout the plant cells. The protein is subsequently extracted from the plant’s leaves in a very pure form. The process can also be carried out in a large-scale closed facility.