On April 8, 2022 Hangzhou Qihan Biotechnology Co., Ltd, an innovative biotechnology company dedicated to applying genome editing technology to cell therapies and organ transplants, reported preclinical data from its NK cell programs, presented during the poster session at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) (Free AACR Whitepaper) Annual Meeting 2022 in New Orleans, Louisiana (Press release, Qihan Biotech, APR 8, 2022, View Source [SID1234611766]).

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NK cells derived from genetically engineered human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) hold great potential to become the next-generation allogeneic cell therapy products.

"We are excited to share the promising data with the community, as we believe that we can utilize our platform to advance the cell therapy medicine to the patients," said Dr. Luhan Yang, CEO of Qihan Biotech. "The data presented in one poster highlight the "Super NK" cells, genetically engineered with enhanced NK function, demonstrating superior killing capacity against blood and solid tumors. Additionally, we presented our immune privileged cell therapy platform in a non-human primate model in a separate poster. Creating a library of monkey iPSCs with up to 21 genetic modifications to evade allogeneic immune rejection and successfully differentiating them into functional monkey NK cells provided us with the unique translational opportunity to study NK Pharmacokinetics (PK) and Pharmacodynamics (PD)."

Poster Presentations:

Functional natural killer cells derived from engineered hiPSC with hypoimmunity gene combo demonstrate hypoimmunity features in evading host attacks.
Session: OPO.TB02.01 – Stem Cell Biology
"Super NK cells" – natural killer cells derived from engineered hiPSC with enhanced NK receptor expression demonstrate excellent anti-tumor effects for solid tumors.
Session: PO.TB02.02 – Stem Cells and Regulatory Pathways in Cancer