Announced in June 2003 and completed in August 2003, Toronto based Generex Biotechnology Corporation (Nasdaq: GNBT) has acquired all of the shares of privately-owned Antigen Express, Inc. Itself also an SBIR involved firm, having received its first SBIR Phase I in August 2003, Generex had previously announced an agreement in principle for a collaboration to develop SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) vaccines with Antigen Express. These vaccines combine the Company's proprietary drug delivery and formulation technology with proprietary Ii protein suppression and Ii-Key peptide vaccine enhancing technologies of Antigen Express. Antigen Express is developing novel therapeutic vaccines for the treatment of malignant and infectious diseases based on two platform technologies discovered Antigen Express. The technology works by inducing specific potent immune responses to attack cancers and infectious agents. The Antigen Express technologies greatly boost T-helper cell responses, which, in turn, elicit strong antibody and cytotoxic cellular responses. T-helper cells also mediate immunological memory, which is crucial for long-term disease-free responses.Antigen Express, Inc. (AE) has discovered lead compounds which regulate the first step in the immune response. AE compounds enhance or inhibit presentation of antigenic peptides to T cells. The AE compounds are derivatives of a segment of the Ii immunoregulatory protein, which during its cleavage and release from MHC Class II molecules acts at an auxiliary regulatory site to control the insertion and locking in of antigenic peptides into the antigenic peptide binding through of the MHC class II molecules, for presentation to T cells. Clinically useful control of this first step in the immune response would allow antigen specific therapy of many diseases, perhaps associated with the genetic alleles of MHC class II linked to disease, without the many toxic side effects of current immunosuppressive therapies.
