The CIML is recognized for its advances in the knowledge of immune system cells involved in allergic reactions, a key stage in understanding the specific immunotherapy method using Viaskin® invented by DBV Technologies
DBV Technologies and Centre d'Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy (CIML) enter in a Collaboration Agreement
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Regulatory News:
DBV Technologies (Paris:DBV) (Euronext: DBV – ISIN: FR0010417345), creator of Viaskin®, a new standard in the treatment of allergies, announced today a partnership with Dr. Bernard Malissen who is working at the Centre d'Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy (CIML). His team is studying immune cells involved in allergic reactions (lymphocytes T and dendritic cells study). DBV Technologies and CIML have decided to collaborate to improve their knowledge of recruitment and mechanisms of actions involved in the epicutaneous treatment of allergies by the EPIT® (Epicutaneous Immunotherapy) method.
DBV Technologies has developed a new specific epicutaneous immunotherapy method (EPIT) using its proprietary technology. During the process of epicutaneous specific immunotherapy, the Viaskin® patch concentrates the allergen in the epidermis layers of the skin where it can be captured by the immune system's cells. This mechanism guarantees the safe use of Viaskin®, as shown by the experimental studies conducted by the DBV Technologies research team. Since its inception, the team has sought to describe the cell mechanisms involved in epicutaneous immunotherapy.
CNRS research director, said, “.
, Chairman and CEO of DBV Technologies, said,
The Program will take place in three distinct parts over an 18-month period: study of cells involved in handling the allergen; migration to the lymph nodes; and transmission of the antigenic information at the lymph node level. This work will be performed jointly between the two entities and at both sites. This agreement was negotiated by Inserm Transfert.
In the US 1.1% of the population (i.e., about 3 million people) are allergic to peanuts, causing 100 to 150 deaths per year. This allergy affects both adults and children and has been estimated to affect 1.8% of young children in the United Kingdom. The prevalence of peanut allergy in other Western countries (e.g. Canada, France, and Spain) has been studied by many researchers and ranges from 0.9% to 1.5%. It is a persistent allergy in the great majority of cases. It is also the most severe of all common food allergies (e.g. milk and eggs) and can be life-threatening to allergic children.
Founded in 1976, the Immunology Center of Marseille-Luminy is an internationally recognized research institute in the field, from its inception, has developed an organizational structure and practices conducive to creativity and risk-taking of its researchers.
From worm to man, from the molecule to the whole organism, the physiological disease, the CIML addresses, numbers of models and scales, all fields of contemporary immunology: the genesis of different cell populations, their patterns of differentiation and activation, their implication in cancer, infectious and inflammatory diseases and mechanisms of cell death.
Based in Marseille, the CIML is a join research unit of CNRS, Inserm and Université Aix-Marseille, which has a staff of 250 employees since January 2012, including 185 scientists, students and postdocs.
For more information on CIML, please visit our website: .
The work of Prof. Bernard Malissen, an immunologist by training, has contributed greatly to characterizing molecules and mechanisms involved in the recognition of antigens by T lymphocytes. He and his team have specialized in studying the receptor for the T lymphocyte antigen, TCR, and created numerous models of transgenic mice allowing all the chain of events involved in degeneration of the TCR antigen recognition site to be studied. Bernard Malissen's team is also interested in dendritic cells (DCs). Models allowing the controlled ablation of certain types of DCs (notably Langerhans cells, resident populations of the epidermis) have allowed their role in immune response development to be evaluated.
Bernard Malissen's work has been awarded numerous distinctions and the FRM immunology prize (1986), the Fondation B. Halpern prize (1988), the prize of the Ligue Nationale contre le Cancer (1992), the Behring-Metchnikoff immunology prize (1994), CNRS Silver Medal (1996), and INSERM grand prize for medical research (2005). With his team, he has been the subject of some 200 publications in prestigious international journals. Bernard Malissen led the Immunology Center from 1995 to 2005 and is the founder and director of the Center Immunophénomic, an institute devoted to the analysis and development of preclinical models in the context of Immunology and the Infectious diseases.
DBV Technologies is opening up a decisive new approach to the treatment of allergy – a major public health issue that is constantly increasing in prevalence. Food allergies represent a true handicap in everyday life for millions of people and thus constitute a major unmet medical need. DBV Technologies has developed a unique, proprietary, worldwide-patented technology for administering an allergen to intact skin and avoiding massive transfer to the blood. The Viaskin® technology combines efficacy and safety as part of a treatment that seeks to improve the patient's tolerability of peanut and thus considerably lower the risk of a systemic, allergic reaction in the event of accidental exposure to the allergen. The company's significant development program has taken this revolutionary method through to the industrial stage in Europe, initially. The product's clinically proven safety of use enables the application of effective desensitization techniques (the efficacy of which is acknowledged worldwide) in the most severe forms of the allergy. DBV Technologies is focusing on food allergies (milk and peanut) for which there are currently no effective treatments. It has developed two products: Viaskin® Peanut and Viaskin® Milk. The clinical development program for Viaskin® Peanut has received Fast Track designation from the US Food and Drug Administration. The company will subsequently develop a Viaskin® patch for young children with house dust mite allergy – a true public health issue because this pathology is one of the main risk factors for childhood asthma. DBV Technologies shares are traded on segment C of Euronext Paris (Ticker: DBV, ISIN code: FR0010417345).
For more information on DBV Technologies, please visit our website: .
CAUTION: Viaskin® is not approved for sale in the USA.
The forward-looking statements, objectives and targets contained herein are based on the Company’s management strategy, current views and assumptions. Such statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results, performance or events to differ materially from those anticipated herein. Furthermore, the Research and Development process involves several stages each of which involve the substantial risk that the Company may fail to achieve its objectives and be forced to abandon its efforts with regards to a product in which it has invested significant sums. Therefore, the Company cannot be certain that favorable results obtained during pre-clinical trials will be confirmed subsequently during clinical trials, or that the results of clinical trials will be sufficient to demonstrate the safe and effective nature of the product concerned. DBV technologies’ business is subject to the risk factors outlined in its registration documents filed with the French Autorité des Marchés Financiers.