Syntekabio Shows Complete Remission Effect of Immuno-Oncology Drug Candidate in Preclinical Animal Models

[Asia Economy Reporter Hyunseok Yoo] STB-C017, an immune-oncology drug candidate discovered by Syntekabio, has been confirmed to induce complete remission and enhance long-term survival effects when administered in combination with two types of immune checkpoint inhibitors.

Syntekabio, an AI-based new drug development company utilizing genomic big data, announced on the 7th that the animal experiment results of the immune-oncology drug candidate STB-C017, discovered through its AI platform DeepMatcher®, were published in the online edition of the prestigious international immunology journal Oncoimmunology.

The research team led by Dr. Hongjae Jeon, Director of the Cancer Center, and Professor Chan Kim from the Department of Hematology and Oncology at Bundang CHA Hospital published a paper titled “Discovery of a novel immunotherapeutic agent regulating the kynurenine pathway through a deep learning model” in Oncoimmunology.

This paper contains the results of animal efficacy evaluations of STB-C017, a dual inhibitor of IDO (indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase) and TDO (tryptophan 2,3-dioxygenase), derived by Syntekabio through DeepMatcher.

IDO and TDO are protein enzymes found in many tumor cells. When activated, they accumulate the immunosuppressive substance kynurenine inside cancer cells, which is known to inhibit the therapeutic effects of immune checkpoint inhibitors.

According to the paper, when STB-C017 was orally administered alone to a mouse model implanted with colon cancer cell lines, tumor infiltration of CD8+ T cells, immune cells that attack cancer cells, increased, and changes in immune-related gene expression patterns were induced.

Furthermore, when STB-C017 was administered in combination with two types of immune checkpoint inhibitors, it improved the tumor immune environment and induced complete remission in more than 60% of the treated mice, demonstrating its potential as a combination therapy with immune checkpoint inhibitors.

In comparative experiments with epacadostat, a single IDO inhibitor, STB-C017 showed superior effects. This was interpreted as being due to STB-C017’s dual inhibitory action on both IDO and TDO.

Currently, immune checkpoint inhibitors actively used show therapeutic effects in only 20% of patients, with the remaining 80% not responding. Interest in immune checkpoint inhibitors is high, as evidenced by over 4,400 clinical trials worldwide investigating combination therapies to improve response rates.

Regarding the study results, the research team led by Dr. Hongjae Jeon and Professor Chan Kim at Bundang CHA Hospital stated, “These results are encouraging for overcoming resistance and improving treatment response rates in patients resistant to the combination therapy of Opdivo and Yervoy, which have recently become standard treatments for kidney cancer, liver cancer, melanoma, and others.”

A Syntekabio representative said, “The notable effects of STB-C017 in animal models demonstrate the performance and competitiveness of our AI platform DeepMatcher.” They added, “Since the discovery of STB-C017, DeepMatcher has been further advanced and expanded with high-performance supercomputing infrastructure, and we are conducting numerous AI drug candidate discovery projects. Syntekabio will focus on rapidly establishing joint pipelines and securing its own pipelines.”

Meanwhile, Syntekabio is an AI drug development platform company combining artificial intelligence (AI) and biotechnology, and is the only listed company in Korea with supercomputer infrastructure. Through its proprietary AI platforms, including the synthetic drug candidate discovery platform DeepMatcher® and the neoantigen prediction platform NEO-ARS™, it contributes to efficient new drug development.