Immetas Therapeutics and GC Biopharma announced that they have entered into a research collaboration to discover and develop novel mRNA therapeutics for the treatment of a broad range of autoimmune diseases. The collaboration combines Immetas? proprietary platform for modulating innate immune pathways with GC Biopharma?s messenger RNA (mRNA) therapeutic and lipid nanoparticle (LNP) delivery platforms. Under the collaboration agreement, Immetas will be responsible for identifying therapeutic targets, generating and characterizing payload molecules, defining disease indications and creating translational and clinical development strategies.

GC Biopharma will be responsible for the design and manufacture mRNA constructs for payload expression, selection of LNP and delivery formulations, and characterization of the combination product candidates. Both companies will jointly conduct subsequent development activities. Additional terms were not disclosed.

Immetas? approach is based on selective modulation of inflammasomes, key sensors and mediators of the innate immune pathway. Inflammasomes have been well characterized in chronic disorders involving multiple body systems, however, current inflammasome inhibitors to date have shown poor selectivity and presented safety challenges.

Immetas has established a comprehensive platform that has generated novel therapeutic molecules targeting various components in the pathway with a high level of selectivity compared with traditional inhibitors to this structurally conserved family. The selection of modality, expression and delivery to optimize treatment outcome are determined by spatial and temporal requirement to effectively disrupt distinct disease biology in each condition. GC Biopharma?s mRNA/LNP approach is one of two delivery platforms Immetas is leveraging.

GC Biopharma has selected mRNA as the new development platform and has been conducting related research since 2017.