Engineered antibodies for type 1 diabetes.
Insulin replacement therapy has transformed type 1 diabetes (T1D) from a lethal disease into a chronic, but manageable, condition. However, insulin replacement does not mimic the endogenous insulin response and complications as a result of long-term treatment therefore cannot always be prevented. Only a permanent cure for T1D could re-establish an independence from the requirement for daily blood glucose measurements and insulin injections. mAbs provide outstanding diagnostic and therapeutic tools to identify and manipulate molecules involved in the pathogenesis of T1D. Their high target specificity endorses them as excellent candidates for immunomodulatory therapy. To improve the efficacy of a mAb it is often necessary to modify the properties of the antibody, such as its size, effector function and immunogenicity. In this review, different engineering approaches and applications of engineered mAbs in the treatment of T1D are discussed.
Hampe
Christiane S
CS
University of Washington, Department of Medicine, 815 Mercer Street, Seattle, WA 98109, USA. champe@u.washington.edu