Ophthalmology

Backgrounds

Eye diseases that cause vision loss have substantial societal implications, with some of the most debilitating eye conditions affecting the elderly and people with diabetes. Neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nAMD) is a common macular degeneration in clinical practice The leading cause of vision loss in the elderly. Currently, the standard treatment for nAMD is the inhibition of VEGF. In addition, inflammation plays an important role in retinal diseases such as diabetic eye disease and age-related macular degeneration. Elevated intraocular interleukin-6 (IL-6) levels are associated with diabetic eye disease and resistance to anti-VEGF therapy in AMD. Similarly, IL-6 and VEGF were associated with decreased visual acuity in patients with uveitic macular edema.

Bispecific Antibodies (BsAbs) for Ophthalmology Therapy

The key challenge in the development of intraocular drugs is to ensure the absence of ocular toxicity. Therapeutic drugs based on dual targeting proteins, such as BsAbs, which can interact with two target epitopes at the same time, may improve the efficacy of intraocular drugs. Regarding the development of BsAbs in retinal therapy, only one BsAb targeting VEGF and angiopoietin-2 (ANG-2) for the treatment of diabetic macular edema (DME) and wet AMD is in full clinical development in ongoing preclinical studies. Using trap antibody fusion technology, researchers have constructed a novel and efficient bispecific molecule targeting VEGF and IL-6, which is expected to become a novel therapeutic candidate for the treatment of retinal vascular diseases and inflammatory diseases. Bispecific and bifunctional antibodies and therapeutic proteins have the potential to increase the efficacy of intraocular drugs.

Fig.1 Schematic illustration of the types of ocular therapeutics and interventions.¹

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