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Because these drugs are mostly monoclonal antibodies, you have to actually develop your own. You can work out what the target is, but because the antibody has e
by robbiep 11y ago
Because these drugs are mostly monoclonal antibodies, you have to actually develop your own.
You can work out what the target is, but because the antibody has extremely high specificity for a specific target, and is high molecular weight, you can't just synthesise it, you need to grow it (An absolutely fascinating process in and of itself)
There have been examples of other drug companies targeting the same target as an existing high value monoclonal antibody drug, however I am aware of at least one example where the 'knockoff' monoclonal antibody actually had harmful effects compared with the original.
The only way you can actually copy the drug is to steal a cell from their lineage and produce your own
- drjohnkasanders 11y agoI am interested to learn about the case with the knockoff having harmful effects. Could you guide me in the right direction?
- robbiep 11y agoOff the top of my head it was a VEGF antagonist, so avastin knockoff. I'll try dig up the paper when I'm off mobile
- robbiep 11y agoSo I have just spent about half an hour looking. I honestly can't remember where this knowledge comes from. My feeling is i learned it on my oncology term 12 months ago. It may have even been a ipilimumab biosimilar. Unfortunately google is mostly saturated with success stories and papers relating to monoclonal antibodies and wherever I heard about the writeup of the failure has vanished into the nether-regions of google. Apologies. If anything comes up, put a contact email in your details and i'll reach out to you.