"Drug-less" Diabetes/Obesity Vaccine Tested in JAX® Mice
September 30, 2009
"Drug-less" Diabetes/Obesity Vaccine Tested in JAX® Mice
A preclinical-stage vaccine company named Braasch Biotech LLC recently announced that it has developed a "drug-less" vaccine that may one day be used to treat diabetes, heart disease, Rett syndrome, and other metabolic disorders (Marketwire 2009).
The vaccine works by generating antibodies highly specific to somatostatin, a hormone that normally limits the body's production of growth hormone (GH) and insulin growth factor 1 (IGF1). The vaccine attenuates but does not completely eliminate somatostatin's effects. As a result, the body produces increased quantities of GH and IGF1. Unlike current GH drugs, which must be administered daily, the new vaccine would be administered only once a month. Braasch believes that their vaccine will be much more effective than prototypes produced by Russian scientists over the past 20 years. In conjunction with the University of Iowa's Center for Biocatalysis and Bioprocessing, Braasch has developed processes for manufacturing large quantities of uniform vaccine for laboratory testing.
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| Figure 1. Percent increase in baseline body weights (means +/- SEM) of vaccinated and control groups of C57BL6/J male mice fed high-fat diet. Mice in treatment groups were vaccinated on days 1 and 21. |
The vaccine was tested in a Diet-induced Obesity (DIO) mouse model - C57BL/6J (000664) male mice - by JAX® In Vivo Services at The Jackson Laboratory–West, Sacramento, California. For six weeks before and during the study, vaccinated and control mice were fed mouse chow containing 60 kcal% fat, six times the fat content of normal mouse chow. During the study, all mice ate similar amounts of food. By the end of the study, vaccinated mice had gained less than half as much weight as controls (Figure 1) – equivalent to a vaccinated 200 pound person gaining only between eight and 14 pounds on a high fat diet while the unvaccinated person gains 30 pounds on the same diet. States Dr. Pali Kaur, In Vivo study director at The Jackson LaboratoryÐWest, "The data set shows that the weight gain phenotype can be reduced in obese mice by the Braasch vaccine treatment. The observed in vivo effects of the vaccine are similar to those of reference compounds quoted in published scientific literature on DIO studies. The preclinical results suggest the therapeutic potential of this vaccine as a drug candidate for the treatment of type 2 diabetes and obesity".
Reference
Marketwire. 2009. New Braasch Biotech vaccine technology provides growth hormone and IGF1 treatments without the use of drugs. August 31, 2009.
