November 9, 2021 -- Synlogic and Ginkgo Bioworks have developed an investigational synthetic biotic medicine for the treatment of homocystinuria (HCU). The companies will highlight the work at the International Congress of Inborn Errors of Metabolism 2021 to be held November 21-23 in Sydney.
HCU is an inherited disorder caused by the loss of function of cystathionine beta-synthase, which results in an excessive accumulation of homocysteine and its metabolites in the blood and urine. Patients develop multisystem clinical manifestations, including ectopia lentis, bone defects, intellectual disability, and life-threatening thromboembolisms, Synlogic said.
The experimental candidate, SYNB1353, is an engineered strain of the probiotic bacteria Escherichia coli Nissle (EcN), which consumes methionine in the gastrointestinal tract and prevents methionine absorption and conversion to homocysteine in plasma.
SYNB1353 was designed using Ginkgo's proprietary codebase. The high-throughput testing of codebase libraries by Ginkgo enabled SYNB1353 to advance from preclinical proof of concept to candidate strain in the space of a year, Synlogic said.
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