SAB Biotherapeutics produces new human antibody treatment for MERS-CoV

SAB Biotherapeutics, Inc., announced on Wednesday that it produced a new human antibody therapeutic to threat the deadly Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) utilizing its novel DiversitAb production platform.

MERS-CoV was first identified in Saudi Arabia in 2012. The World Health Organization has subsequently identified it as a threat to global health.

There were no treatments previously available for MERS-CoV. SAB’s DiversitAb platform leverages transchromosomic cattle (Tc Bovine) that have been genetically designed to produce large amounts of human antibodies (immunoglobin G) in response to an immunogenic antigen.

Research efforts were led by global infectious disease experts at the Neval Medical Research Center and MERS-CoV expert Matthew B. Friedman, associate professor of microbiology and immunology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and are published in the most recent online edition of Science Translational Medicine.

“These results are very promising,” Frieman said. “This gives us a potential way to attack MERS and provides evidence that using transgenic cows can rapidly produce therapeutics.”

Human testing will confirm if passive immunization with the antibodies can treat infected individuals. SAB is currently working with the National Institutes of Health to submit an initial review drug application for Phase 1 clinical trials to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.