RADIKAL THERAPEUTICS, INC. — Department of Health and Human Services SBIR Phase I: DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Radikal Therapeutics (RTX) is pioneering a novel ther
RADIKAL THERAPEUTICS, INC. — SBIR Phase I award from Department of Health and Human Services.
- Amount
- $225,000
- Agency
- Department of Health and Human Services · National Institutes of Health
- Program / Phase
- SBIR · Phase I
- Solicitation
- PA13-234
- NAICS
- —
- Place of performance
- MA
- Period
- —
Description
DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Radikal Therapeutics (RTX) is pioneering a novel therapy to restore immune tolerance and arrest progressive depigmentation in vitiligo. At Loyola University (LUC), a variant to inducible Heat Shock Protein 70 was developed with remarkable potential for the prevention and treatment of autoimmune vitiligo. Carrying only a single amino acid modification to the protein, this variant HSP70iQ435A (designated CM ) was found to have a curative effect involving long-lasting tolerization of dendritic cells (DCs) and inhibition of T ell influx to the skin. Depigmentation was inhibited by CM DNA vaccination to a remarkable extent in both preventive and therapeutic settings using different spontaneous, T cell receptor transgenic mouse models of vitiligo. Translated to humans, the inflammatory CD11b+CD11c+ subset of DCs held responsible for precipitating and perpetuating vitiligo is found in increased abundance among circulating and skin infiltrating DC. We thus hypothesize that t