The Antibody Society

the official website of the antibody society

An international non-profit supporting antibody-related research and development.

2024 James S. Huston Antibody Science Talent Award recipient is announced!

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We are delighted to announce that Dr. Jenna Guthmiller has been selected as the 2024 James S. Huston Antibody Science Talent Award Recipient!

Dr. Jenna Guthmiller is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Immunology and Microbiology at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.

Jenna received her undergraduate degree from South Dakota State University in 2013 and her PhD from the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center in 2017. She conducted her postdoctoral research at the University of Chicago and established her lab at the University of Colorado in 2022.

Dr. Guthmiller’s research focuses on understanding how broadly protective humoral immunity against rapidly evolving pathogens develops and can be harnessed by next-generation vaccines.

Jenna has received numerous awards and accolades, including a NIH Pathway to Independence Award, NIH Director’s New Innovator Award, U.S. National Academy of Sciences Kavli Fellowship, The Michelson Prize for Human Immunology, the European Scientific Working Group on Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses Young Scientist Vaccine Innovation Award, and the American Society for Virology Ann Palmenberg Junior Investigator Award.

Dr. Guthmiller will give a lecture on her work at the Antibody Engineering and Therapeutics conference in San Diego, California (December 15 – 18, 2024), as well as in a post-meeting webinar. The lecture will be made freely available on-demand on The Antibody Society’s YouTube Channel.

FDA approves HYMPAVZI™ (marstacimab-hncq)

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On October 11, 2024, Pfizer Inc. announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved HYMPAVZI™ (marstacimab-hncq) for routine prophylaxis to prevent or reduce the frequency of bleeding episodes in adults and pediatric patients 12 years of age and older with hemophilia A (congenital factor VIII deficiency) without factor VIII (FVIII) inhibitors, or hemophilia B (congenital factor IX deficiency) without factor IX (FIX) inhibitors. Marstacimab is an IgG1l monoclonal antibody targeting tissue factor pathway inhibitor, a single-chain polypeptide that can reversibly inhibit Factor Xa. The antibody’s Fc mutations (L234A, L235A, G237A) impair Fc effector functions.

HYMPAVZI  is the first hemophilia medicine approved in the U.S. to be administered via a pre-filled, auto-injector pen. The approval was based on results of the Phase 3 BASIS study (NCT03938792), which evaluated the efficacy and safety marstacimab in adult and teenage participants with severe hemophilia A or moderately severe to severe hemophilia B.  In the study, HYMPAVZI reduced the annualized bleeding rate (ABR) for treated bleeds by 35% and 92% after a 12-month active treatment period compared to routine prophylaxis and on-demand treatment, respectively, in patients with hemophilia A or B without inhibitors. The safety profile for HYMPAVZI was consistent with Phase 1/2 results.

In September 2024, the European Medicines Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use adopted a positive opinion for marstacimab for the routine prophylaxis of bleeding episodes in adults and adolescents 12 years and older with severe hemophilia A without FVIII inhibitors, or severe hemophilia B without FIX inhibitors. A decision by the European Commission is expected by the end of 2024.

Curious about what other antibody therapeutics are approved or in regulatory review? Our online table contains details for over 200 such antibodies! 

 

New episode of our Antibody News podcast is now available!

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Antibody News is the 10-minute news podcast of The Antibody Society.

In this episode, we cover new business news, advancements in the clinical pipeline, and important regulatory updates, including new marketing applications and marketing approvals from September 15 – October 1, 2024.

Listen for FREE on:

PodBean –> https://lnkd.in/eqchSdT7
Spotify –> https://lnkd.in/e_5BeucT
Apple Podcasts –> https://lnkd.in/ec9S6HJp
Amazon Music –> https://lnkd.in/es5Dz3hW
Audible –> https://lnkd.in/einBGchf

Register now for the Sept 26th AIRR Community Seminar

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Registration for the September 26th (4:00 PM – 5:30 PM CET) AIRR-C Seminar Series session is open. Following the usual format of the series, an established and an early career scientist will discuss their AIRR-seq related research. Sol Efroni, of Bar Ilan University, Israel, will present “The T cell receptor core qualities, as seen by a language model.” Next, Giulio Isacchini, of Imprint, USA, will present “Generative Modeling of AIRRs with SoNNia.”

Register now!

Visit the AIRR Community Seminar Series website to learn more about this monthly series and access the recordings of past sessions.

Results of the Imaging Calendar Competition announced!

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The Society’s Communication and Membership Committee is glad to announce that:
Eva Smorodina (University of Oslo and Oslo University Hospital, Norway) is the winner of our Imaging Calendar Competition! 
Congratulations!

The Imaging Calendar Competition ran from April 1st to July 15th 2024 and was open to all members. Participants submitted a high-resolution image with a brief explanation of the research behind it and the scientific method. This year we accepted both wet-lab and in-silico originated images.

Based on the results of our online poll, the winning image is “Getting closer to binding with every step” by Eva Smorodina (University of Oslo and Oslo University Hospital, Norway)

Image description: The image represents different levels of complexity surrounding antibody-antigen binding. We start from a more general understanding of the interaction kinetics with SPR, then identify the global binding site with cryo-EM, refine the region with HDX-MS to achieve peptide-level resolution, and move forward towards residue- and atom-wise resolution with computational techniques like docking and molecular dynamics. All these steps give us a better understanding of the structural rules behind antibody-antigen binding.

Antibodies used: Trastuzumab in complex with HER2

Instrument used: PyMOL, FoldX, IgFold

The winner will receive:

The winning image will be featured as the cover image for the 2025 volume of mAbs, and also as the cover image of the calendar. The calendar will be distributed at the 2024 Antibody Engineering & Therapeutics, in San Diego, in December.

 

We are also glad to reveal the scientists behind the other short-listed images. These images will be included as well in The Antibody Society 2025 calendar, one every month.

Stefania Vilbois (University of Lausanne, Switzerland): Intravital mouse melanoma.

Jessica Anania (University of Southampton, UK): Follicular Dendritic Cell Organization in Germinal Centers for Immune Memory.

Andrew O’Connor (University of Southampton, UK): Inflammation in the mouse cochlea.

Rodrigo García Valiente (Amsterdam UMC, The Netherlands): Clonal fireworks.

Danielle Fails (Fortis Life Sciences, USA): Cells in Focus.

Shaoli Lin (National Cancer Institute, NIH, USA): Therapeutic antibody targeting GPC3 in liver cancer.

Suzanne Buss (University of Southampton, UK): Astrocytes – helping protect our brain.

Anthony Cheung (King’s College London, UK): Antibody-drug conjugates trigger microvesicle release ahead of endosomal internalization.

Alicia Chenoweth (King’s College London, UK): Heterogeneity of melanoma.