Technology

Our team has developed a ground-breaking modular platform technology ‘HypoxiCAR’. We tell you more about it on this page.

Cancer

10 million people die each year from cancer

Hypoxic

Greater than 60% of all solid cancers are hypoxic

HypoxiCAR

HypoxiCAR circumvents barriers faced by CAR-T immunotherapy in tackling solid cancers

Training the immune system to detect cancer using CAR-T

The immune system has an exquisite ability to identify and eradicate abnormal cells in our bodies while protecting healthy cells around them. Cancers can also be seen as abnormal cells by the immune system and, as such, can be targeted by immune responses. However, as cancers develop, they are able to utilise a variety of different approaches to hide from the immune system to continue to grow and spread to distant sites in the body without restriction.

Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR)-T cell immunotherapy ‘living therapies’ represent an exciting new era for the immunotherapy of cancer. CAR-T cells are a form of cellular immunotherapy in which a patient’s natural protective immune cells (T-cells) are genetically engineered outside of the patient within the laboratory to express receptors on their surface ‘CARs’ which enable these cells to identify tumour cells and ‘see’ the cancer. Armies of these tumour killing immune cells can then be expanded before re-introducing back to the patient to find and attack the cancer, which these T-cells previously failed to do.

When CAR-T cells find cancerous cells, the CAR engineered onto the T-cell surface sends a signalling into the T-cell to trigger their innate ability to kill the target cancer cell. These therapies have revolutionised the treatment of certain liquid cancers. However, their use against solid tumours has highlighted barriers for these types of cancer.

We at Korecyte Bio are re-thinking CAR-T for the treatment of solid tumours to break down current barriers for improved outcome for patients with cancer. The HypoxiCAR technology is currently at the preclinical stage.

Korecyte Bio is an international biotech startup based between the Netherlands and United Kingdom that was established in 2023. Our mission is to develop next-generation CAR-T cellular immunotherapies

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Breaking to the core of cancer using HypoxiCAR

Our dedicated scientists at Korecyte Bio have pioneered a new approach to CAR-T for treating solid cancers called HypoxiCAR. This patented and modular technology permits CAR-T cells to remain dormant within the patient’s bloodstream until they sense they are within the tumour, at which point they activate to attack the cancer. Our unique approach has generated a living therapy capably of its own decision-making for when to activate at the correct time. HypoxiCAR T-cells can sense the tumour through registering the lower levels of oxygen present in the microenvironment, a feature called ‘hypoxia’, associated with most solid tumours. This allows HypoxiCAR T-cells to navigate healthy tissues in a patient without off-tumour activation, preserving their killing capacity while minimises the toxicity experienced by the patient. As such, HypoxiCAR T-cells can achieve superior anti-tumour killing potential and permit higher doses of these cells to be safely infused.

Furthermore, as the CAR is not present on the T-cell outside of the tumour, it allows for CARs utilised to detect board targets, making it extremely difficult for the tumour to escape detection and hide. HypoxiCAR is a highly stringent and also dynamic therapy, where the cell is programmed to return to its dormant state if it were to leave the tumour, or eradicate the disease from a patient, where it can wait and act as an early responder to any future cancers that might appear. CAR-T is a fast-moving field and Korecyte’s modular platform can be built into almost any CAR, or carrier cell, for tackling solid tumours.

We are Korecyte Bio and we are dedicated towards protecting every cancer patient’s tomorrow, by getting to the core of cancer.

Korecyte’s patented HypoxiCAR platform technology

HypoxiCAR is a stringent dual ‘hypoxia’ sensing switch which allows the T-cell to detect when they have reached the tumour to unleash their killing potential. The two modules to HypoxiCAR’s success are; 1) a hypoxia-responsive element (HRE) that preferentially drives CAR expression in the tumour microenvironment and 2) an oxygen-degradation domain (ODD) that degrades CARs when the cell is in healthy tissues.

Core publication (download):
Hypoxia-sensing CAR T cells provide safety and efficacy in treating solid tumors