Anti-Virulence Factors Antibodies Development for Superbugs
Depriving pathogens of virulence factors can modulate the pathogenesis of bacteria. Therefore, virulence factor-specific monoclonal antibodies blocking bacterial infection can be applied to the study of superbugs. Antimicrobial monoclonal antibodies can target virulence factors on the bacterial surface to hinder pathogenicity, thus providing a different therapeutic approach in the fight against antibiotic resistance.
Ace Therapeutics offers services for the development of monoclonal antibodies targeting virulence factors, which is a promising alternative approach to fighting superbug infections.
Anti-Virulence Factors Antibody Therapy
Virulence factors are bacterial products that pathogens use to invade their hosts and cause disease. Some of these factors include adhesion, toxins, and specialized secretion systems to facilitate the genetic regulation of virulence traits. Because virulence factors are critical to pathogen biological activity, they are potential targets for antibody therapies.
Fig. 1 Anti-bacterial mAbs block surface associated virulence factors. (Wang H, et al., 2022)
These targets include a number of bacterial outer membrane proteins, which include processes involved in adhesion, bacterial biosynthesis, and other related processes. Other targets include the population sensing system (QS), which regulates the production of multiple virulence factors.
Anti-Virulence Factors Antibodies Development Services
Our service is to search for virulence factors of target pathogens, such as adhesins and motility, and to develop specific antibodies targeting the virulence factors so that drug-resistant bacteria can be attenuated.
Inhibition of adhesion
Bacterial infections begin when a pathogen attaches to a host cell, leading to disease progression. We search for and target key virulence factors such as adhesins, which play a key role in the adhesion machinery, and develop antibodies to impede drug-resistant bacterial virulence. Some of the targets may include, sortase, as well as the bacterial hairs or flagella, which play a key role in the virulence mechanism in Staphylococcus, Streptococcus, Enterococcus and Listeria monocytogenes.
Targeting the regulatory pathway of virulence factor expression
We chose to study pathways involved in bacterial pathogenesis as antibody targets that are involved in the invasion of hosts by drug-resistant bacteria and can modulate bacterial pathogenesis so that drug-resistant bacteria with reduced virulence can be defeated by antibiotics.
Advantages of Our Services
Anti-virulence factor antibody therapy may be a promising therapeutic approach for the treatment of various drug-resistant bacterial infections. The advantages of our development are as follows.
- Our development strategy targets virulence factors and does not target the growth pathway, thus reducing the selection pressure on resistance genes.
- We develop therapies that do not harm the host and are superior to conventional antibiotic therapy in fighting a wide range of bacterial infections.
- We develop antibody agents that can be combined with antibiotics to help eliminate drug-resistant bacterial infections and prevent the development of new drug resistance.
- We are able to develop appropriate evaluation mechanisms to identify and assess the effectiveness of antibody agents against drug-resistant bacterial infections.
Anti-virulence antibody therapies are an emerging area of research in drug-resistant bacteria that reduces the selection pressure for drug resistance. We are making efforts to develop such broad-spectrum drugs and also provide research advantages for the treatment of multiple drug-resistant bacterial infections. Contact us if you need antibody development support.
References
- Wang H, et al. Anti-bacterial monoclonal antibodies: next generation therapy against superbugs. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol, 2022, 106, 3957–3972.
- Ghazaei C. Anti-virulence Therapy Against Bacterial Infections: Mechanisms of Action and Challenges. J Kermanshah Univ Med Sci, 2021; 25(3).