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CEL-SCI's L.E.A.P.S. Technology Shows Potential to Treat Swine Influenza in Preclinical Studies

Peptide-based vaccines could prove efficacious for both prophylactic and therapeutic treatments

VIENNA, Va., April 28 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- CEL-SCI Corporation (NYSE AMEX: CVM) announced today that preclinical studies have demonstrated that vaccines utilizing its proprietary L.E.A.P.S.(TM) (Ligand Epitope Antigen Presentation System) vaccine technology could potentially induce protection against illnesses such as swine influenza. In pre-clinical studies using mouse models, several different L.E.A.P.S. conjugates focused on different diseases induced protection and disease improvement. In addition, it was recently presented that the L.E.A.P.S. vaccines work on human cells and that the L.E.A.P.S. vaccines are able to induce cellular responses without excessive amounts of proinflammatory cytokines. In the case of prior pandemic influenza, such as the "Spanish Influenza" and more recently in avian flu, patients with stronger immune systems had a greater chance of dying because their immune response was too strong (too many proinflammatory cytokines). A L.E.A.P.S. vaccine may be able to work around that problem. While normally cytokines may play a key role in preventing and treating swine flu, in some cases excessive cytokine amounts may exacerbate disease as it appears that, unlike the normal flu which affects the very young and very old most severely, swine flu may be more like the avian flu which hits people in their prime more severely.

The L.E.A.P.S. technology combines a small peptide that activates the immune system with a small peptide from a disease-related protein, such as a herpes simplex virus (HSV) glycoprotein, to make a vaccine that induces a defined immune response. The Company hopes to commence clinical trials in humans in order to demonstrate that the L.E.A.P.S. vaccine act and stimulate human dendritic cells in man in a similar manner as seen to isolated murine and human dendritic cells ex vivo and in vivo in the mouse. Dendritic cells direct the subsequent immune response to a vaccine by presenting the vaccine's antigen(s) to the appropriate T lymphocyte and then deliver specific cytokine proteins to the T cell to determine the immune response outcome to the specific vaccine.

Each L.E.A.P.S. construct is composed of a T cell binding ligand (TCBL) which has previously demonstrated the ability to induce and elicit protective immunity and antigen specific antibody production in animal models. In CEL-SCI's L.E.A.P.S. swine flu vaccine the TCBLs will be coupled to two different and known highly conserved peptide protective epitopes from two different essential proteins common to all influenza A virus strains.



CEL-SCI Corporation is developing products that empower immune defenses. Its lead product is Multikine(R) which is being readied for a global Phase III trial. The Company has operations in Vienna, Virginia, and Baltimore, Maryland.


SOURCE CEL-SCI Corporation
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