The gene therapy technology uses Seneca Valley Virus (SVV) to exclusively target cancer cells with TEM 8 expression. Normal cells lack tumor endothelial marker-8 (TEM 8) expression and are therefore not infected by SVV-001 immunotherapies. Studies in multiple human tumor types indicate that TEM 8 expression is an adverse indicator of long-term survival and is associated with cancer metastasis. The company plans to develop combination products to be delivered intravenously. They include:

• SVV-012 (SVV+ anti-programmed cell death ligand 1 [PD-L1]) designed to enhance the CD8+ T-cell response against tumors
• SVV-024 (SVV+ enhanced interleukin-2 [IL-2] gene) designed to bind IL-2 receptors to activate the immune response in tumors without activating CD25, thereby avoiding IL-2 toxicities
• SVV-037 (SVV+ chemokine C-X-C motif ligand 9 [CXCL-9]) designed to express the CXCL-9 in the tumor microenvironment and promote recruitment of immune cells into tumors
• SVV-044 (SVV+ transforming growth factor [TGF]-beta decoy) designed to block TGF-beta signaling in tumors and avoid immunosuppression
• SVV- 058 (SVV+ nitroreductase) designed to function as a prodrug and convert cytotoxic metabolites selectively in the tumor microenvironment
• SVV- 069 (SVV+ IL-2/IL-15 fusion protein) vectors designed to improve immune cell trafficking and infiltration into tumors and provide both T-cell and natural killer (NK)-cell signals

Each product has been or is being produced on Seneca's SVV platform. The company anticipates preclinical animal studies to begin in the second quarter of 2021.

The company also announced an SVV-001 armed construct program for the development of precision medicine constructs expressing patient-specific neoantigens.

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