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The
AMIDA Technology
Overview
The immune system recognises viruses, bacteria, but also
tumour cells
as "foreign" by means of specific structures that are not found on
healthy cells. An infection or tumour usually elicits an immune
reaction
resulting in the activation of specific immune cells (the cellular
immune response) and in the production of antibodies (the humoral
immune
response). These responses may be triggered by viral or bacterial
proteins (such is the case with papilloma virus or tetanus), or by one
or more cellular proteins on the surface of tumour cells that may be
overly abundant (such as her/2neu on breast cancer cells) or have been
changed in some way (as is the case with Mucin-1 on several tumour
types).
Antigens on tumour cells
can elicit an immune
system-triggered
response, leading to the generation of antibodies. Upon binding of
these
antibodies to specific structures on cell surfaces, a series of
immunological processes is initiated, leading to the destruction of the
cells. However, in certain situations (tumours, immune suppression),
these lines of defense cannot offer adequate protection, and the immune
system must rely on outside help. This help can be provided e.g. in the
form
of therapeutic antibodies against tumour-specific antigens. The most
direct means to identify such specific target proteins is through
proteomic procedures, particularly since the structures that serve as
targets (e.g., for therapeutic antibodies) are proteins. Immanent to
AMIDA is an intelligent filtre that simultaneously examins each
protein's relevance and allows only a fraction of these proteins
through
for further analysis.
AMIDA fulfils all of these
requirements: by making use of the
patient's antibodies to select for the important target structures, we
have installed an "immunological filter" in our procedure. In contrast,
other methods that are based upon proteomics or genomics must deal with
the problem of determining which of the multitude of potential target
proteins are actually of any importance or value. The vast majority of
candidates recovered using these means turns out to be useless. This
lengthy and expensive process of target screening is unnecessary when
using AMIDA since it can be assumed that the specific antibodies
isolated by this method are directly associated with the disease. The
immune system itself does the target screening for us. Thanks
to this immunological filter, we are only identifying targets that are
in direct association with the disease.
AMIDA is an unique advancement in functional
proteomics and a powerful
tool for the identification of new antigens and protein targets for
therapeutics. Combined with state-of-the-art mass spectrometry, AMIDA
has demonstrated its potential on different kinds of human cancer
as well as on antigens from infectious microorganisms. By using
patient-specific material (like a small tumour biopsy), we evaluate
your
samples within 2 weeks for specific antigens recognized by the humoral
immune system.
Vaecgene
is also pursuing a molecular diagnostic
approach to the development of cancer tests - the measurement of cancer
antibodies in blood. This approach has several advantages over other
technologies. Cancer-specific antibodies develop very early and usually
prior to the detection of tumour marker proteins or palpable tumours;
therefore, antibody-based tests are superior to commercially
available tumour marker protein blood tests. In addition, cancer
antibodies are found directly in blood and not only on tumour cells,
which is a major hurdle to the development of tumour marker protein
tests.
Services
Identification of humoral antigens specific for or
associated with cancer, infectious diseases or autoimmune diseases.
The process
Upon submission of your samples, we will perform a
duplicate AMIDA
search, including electronic imaging, mass spectrometry and database
search.
Finally, a summary file is provided which lists all
antigens
identified.
Upon request, literature searches and bioinformatics can also be
performed.
Please
contact us for further informations, instructions on
sample preparation, and pricing.
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