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Agenus Publishes Seminal Study on Botensilimab’s Activity in Treatment-Resistant Cancers
LEXINGTON, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Agenus Inc. (NASDAQ: AGEN), a leader in developing novel immunological agents to treat various cancers, today announced
About this update from Agenus Inc.
[{"type":"text","content":" LEXINGTON, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--\nAgenus Inc. (NASDAQ: AGEN), a leader in developing novel immunological agents to treat various cancers, today announced the publication of a seminal study in the prestigious Cancer Discovery, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research, detailing the novel mechanism of action and effectiveness of botensilimab, an investigational, novel multifunctional anti-CTLA-4 antibody, in various treatment-resistant cancers.\n\n\nThe paper, entitled “Botensilimab, an Fc-Enhanced Anti-CTLA-4 Antibody, Is Effective Against Tumors Poorly Responsive to Conventional Immunotherapy,” highlights several key findings:\n\n\n\nDemonstrated Activity Across Multiple Cancers: Botensilimab has shown increased activity in multiple treatment-resistant cancers, including those that have progressed on prior checkpoint inhibitors.\n\n\n\nFc-Enhanced Design for Multifunctional Immune Activation: Unlike traditional anti-CTLA-4 antibodies, botensilimab’s Fc-enhanced design allows it to leverage multiple immune-activating mechanisms simultaneously. This includes enhanced T cell priming, reduction of intratumoral regulatory T cells, and activation of antigen-presenting cells, leading to a robust anti-tumor response.\n\n\n\nActivity Independent of Conventional Limitations: Botensilimab shows clinical activity regardless of factors that typically limit conventional immunotherapy efficacy, such as tumor neoantigen burden and FcγRIIIA genotype. This broadens its potential applicability across diverse patient populations.\n\n\n\nRemodeling the Tumor Microenvironment: The antibody uniquely remodels the tumor microenvironment, transforming \"cold\" tumors that are currently unresponsive to immune therapies into \"hot\" immunologically active tumors. This is achieved by reducing regulatory T cells and increasing T cell inflammation gene signatures within the tumor microenvironment.\n\n\n\nPromise in Difficult-to-Treat Cancers: Botensilimab demonstrates significant promise in treating over nine difficult-to-treat cancers, including microsatellite stable colorectal cancer and may extend clinical benefits to patient populations historically unresponsive to conventional immune checkpoint inhibitors.\n\n\n\n“We are thrilled to share these groundbreaking findings with the scientific community,” said Dhan Chand, PhD, lead author ...