Quad wins patent for alternative to magnetic beads in CAR T separation
The Massachusetts-based company announced last week it has received a patent for its T-lymphocyte culture reagent QuickGel, entitled: ‘Methods and Compositions for activation or expansion of T lymphocytes.’
The platform is based on a biocompatible dissolvable polymer which can be functionalized with capture or signaling ligands depending on the application.
“The described patent pertains to using Quickgel as a culture substrate acting as a synthetic antigen presenting cell (APC) which in turn will causes T-cell to stimulate and in turn grow,” Chad Decker – VP of Sales and Marketing at Quad – told Biopharma-Reporter.
“We offer a platform that will eliminate the magnetic debeading unit operations while providing flexibility in signaling ligands.”
While magnetic bead for cell separation and culture are “a great tool for research applications where scalability, qualification, cell integrity, and toxicity are not the prime directive,” Decker said their use in the CAR T-cell therapy space in removing those particles downstream results in product loss, additional qualification steps and increased operator time.
While he did not comment on how the two successful CAR T-cell therapies – Novartis’ Kymriah and Gilead’s Yescarta – are activated, he said QuickGel would bring a number of advantages to such therapies.
“The benefits of our platform comes in eliminating a unit operation such as magnetic debeading which will generate cost savings in decreasing operator time, reagents, and qualification.”
He added: “The flexibility of the platform can be tailored to improve transduction efficiency which could decrease the cost of expensive viral reagents. In addition, improving T-cell stimulation would drive T-cell phenotypes thus potentially producing more persistent T-cells allowing improved efficacy, decreased dosing, and decreased manufacturing time.”
