A new study led by Queen Mary University of London has demonstrated the effectiveness of using a novel light technology to monitor the presence of anti-drug antibodies in the treatment of multiple sclerosis (MS), which can lead to drug resistance and treatment failure.
A new study led by Queen Mary University of London has demonstrated the effectiveness of using a novel light technology to monitor the presence of anti-drug antibodies in the treatment of multiple sclerosis (MS), which can lead to drug resistance and treatment failure.
The researchers say that they have also applied the technology to COVID-19 for potential use in antibody testing to determine whether someone has previously been infected with the virus.
Antibodies are proteins that are made by the immune system to fight infection. They can also be used as drugs to fight disease. Alemtuzumab is an antibody designed to kill T and B cells – the major cellular components of the adaptive immune response – and was first used in white blood cell cancers and more recently in MS. However, this can sometimes result in the production of anti-drug antibodies, which prevent Alemtuzumab from working as effectively and lead to patients not responding to treatment.
The GloBody™ platform is a new tool which uses a light-producing enzyme, called nanoluciferase, to detect if anti-drug antibodies are present in a patient sample, which can cause allergies and stop the treatment from working. This is used to show which people are likely to respond to treatment and can predict which people are likely to fail treatment before it occurs, so that they can be switched to a different drug. This can prevent people from accumulating disability due to treatment failure.
Read more at Queen Mary University of London
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