Anaerobic Manufacturing and Molecular Analytical Process Optimization to Support Clinical Development of Live Biotherapeutic Products

ABSTRACT Allergic diseases including atopic dermatitis, food allergy, and allergic asthma represent a global health problem that disproportionately impacts children. Surprisingly, there are no approved approaches to prevent the development of these diseases in at-risk individuals, resulting in chronic morbidity and economic burden. The management of asthma, for example, carries a steep cost burden of billions of dollars per year in the US alone, of which nearly 20 billion is spent on standard of care treatments with variable efficacy. Food allergy management is generally limited to allergen avoidance and rescue from severe acute anaphylaxis. There is a crucial need to develop innovative strategies to prevent the onset of these Type 1 allergic diseases rather than treating their symptoms. A preventative approach targeting at-risk individuals could significantly reduce the morbidity and healthcare burden associated with these increasingly common conditions. Studies confirm the link between gut microbiota development, immunological training, and allergic disease onset in childhood, and it is now clear that allergic disease risk is associated with aberrant microbial exposures over the first year of life. Longitudinal gut microbiota profiling studies in infants and children show that a loss of specific immunomodulatory commensal bacteria, and their metabolic networks, precedes allergic disease development. Using infant gut microbiota data sets and in vivo allergic disease models, Siolta Therapeutics has designed a live biotherapeutic product (LBP), STMC-103H, to stimulate tolerant immunological development and prevent allergic disease onset in at-risk individuals. STMC-103H contains three distinct active ingredient bacteria isolated from healthy human stool. Siolta has performed extensive cGMP manufacturing development, including formulation, process, and analytical method development, to support Phase 1 and Phase 2 clinical trials of STMC-103H under an IND with the FDA. In this project, we will build on our previous STMC-103H drug product development to improve the stability, potency, and characterization approaches for late-stage clinical trials and subsequent commercialization. Success of this project will directly support the regulatory and commercial development of STMC-103H. Indirectly, this work will improve the manufacturing and clinical development of diverse candidate LBPs containing sensitive live bacteria with high therapeutic potential. Siolta will also seek to license novel manufacturing approaches to other LBP developers.