F-Star's modularantibody technology allows it to engineer additional antigen-binding sites intoboth antibodies and antibody fragments. Its Fcab antibody fragments enable theproduction of entities a third of the size of normal antibodies with the samefunctionality, but a longer half-life than antibody fragments usually have.Fcabs, according to FitzGerald, can be used as therapeutic products or asmodules for generating mAb2 antibodies. F-Star's mAb2, or bi-specific,antibodies offer greater functionality than their conventional counterparts aswell as the option of having two binding sites for the same disease antigen,dual targeting against a second antigen or using the additional binding site forthe delivery of the antibody to a specific tissue.
"We believe that F-Star's modular antibody technology hasthe potential to offer important functional advantages over conventionalantibodies and will potentially allow us to generate highly differentiateddrugs," Susan Herbert, head of portfolio development at Merck Serono, saidin a press release.
