Company: OCEA
Filing Date: 2025-04-08
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0001641172-25-003155
Chunk: 2090

Company: Ocean Biomedical, Inc.
Filing Date: 2025-04-08
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1A
Chunk 2090
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 lifecycle and thus only available
for intervention during the first five minutes of infection. Furthermore, P. falciparum disease progression is dependent upon repeated
rounds of schizont formation, merozoite egress, and infection of new erythrocytes (see lifecycle description above), and each time the
cycle repeats the parasite again becomes vulnerable to anti-PfSEA-1 or anti-PfGARP antibodies. In contrast, parasites that escape the
small window of intervention induced by the RTS,S vaccine are not prevented from further growth and replication. The subsequent unimpeded
progression through the parasite lifecycle is likely a primary contributor to the relatively low immunization success rate seen with
RTS,S.

We
are currently evaluating whether a vaccine targeting PfSEA-1, PfGARP or a combination of the two antigens would present the best opportunity
to protect patients from P. falciparum infection.

ODA-611—Anti-PfGARP
mAbs

We
produced a series of mAbs in mice that were immunized with laboratory generated recombinant PfGARP. Of the 16 mAbs that reacted with
PfGARP in an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay, or ELISA, only one mAb killed parasites in culture (see Fig 12). We sequenced and expressed
the heavy-chain and light-chain variable regions (the genes that encode the mAb), and the resulting recombinant mAb had a dissociation
constant, or Kd, of 2.9 nM, (indicating strong binding of the monoclonal to its target PfGARP) and killed parasites in culture. A monovalent
antigen-binding fragment, or Fab, of this antibody also killed parasites in culture. These data confirmed that anti-PfGARP-mediated killing
occurs in the absence of complement, cellular effector functions, or antigen cross-linking. We expect that a humanized version of this
antibody will form the basis for our ODA-611 program.

Figure
12. Monoclonal anti-PfGARP kill parasites. Anti-PfGARP mAb kills parasites. Ring stage 3D7 parasites were cultured in the presence of
media alone, normal mouse IgG (1 mg/ml) or anti-PfGARP mAbs (mAb 7857 or mAb 7899, at 1 mg/ml).

ODA-579—small
molecule targeting Pf