Rob Armstrong, CEO of Artax Biopharma, highlights the basic mechanism of action of Nck modulators and how they differ from traditional immunosuppressant drugs to treat autoimmune diseases. Taking this adjustable thermostat approach aims to modulate the immune response rather than completely suppressing the response, potentially reducing side effects. The oral, small molecule drug is an advantage over injectable biologics currently dominating the automimmune disease treatment landscape.

Rob explains, "Nck stands for non-catalytic kinase, and what Nck is is an adapter protein that interacts with the T cell receptor. Its role is basically to amplify any signals when an antigen is presented to the T cell receptor. It's really interesting because it's called signal one. In other words, it's the beginning of the immune cascade when an antigen is presented. And what's interesting is that it's upstream of what the target of most other drugs are, which are the cytokines that are the offending entities for many of the autoimmune diseases. So what Nck does basically is it amplifies different types of antigens that are bound to the T cell receptor."

"So, T cell receptors are a fascinating construct of proteins because they need to address the binding of antigens that are across an incredibly different range of avidity. In other words, it has to be able to be activated by both very strong avidity antigens and weak antigens. So what Nck does is it amplifies the signal when the antigen is a weak antigen, but when it's a strong antigen, Nck is really not necessary at all. And that particular distinction is why we modulate the immune system instead of suppressing it."

artaxbiopharma.com

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