Macomics announces neurodegeneration and neuroinflammation applications of ENIGMAC drug discovery platform

Macomics Ltd, a leader in macrophage drug discovery, announces that it has validated its ENIGMAC™ platform in neurodegeneration and neuroinflammation applications.

Macomics’ ENIGMAC drug discovery platform is designed to discover therapeutic targets and unlock disease specific target biology. The platform enables identification and validation of novel targets and provides a translationally relevant path to the clinic through the development of more physiologically relevant human models combined with proprietary gene editing technology.

There is clear evidence of causal human genetics in neurodegeneration and the role that microglia, the resident macrophages in the brain, play in neurodegenerative disease including Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis, and ALS/MND with several recent studies linking lipid loading with dysfunctional microglia phenotypes.

Already proven in first-in-class target validation is oncology, ENIGMAC is a proprietary technology developed to produce gene editable microglia as well as macrophages. The platform can knock in or knock out genes of interest via CRISPRa or CRISPRi expression in iPSC derived cells, unlocking the opportunity for new target discovery informed by human data.

For neurology disease-related drug discovery, Macomics has focused on lipid uptake effects on microglia to mimic inflammation combined with lipid loading. Now tested in several readouts including lysosomal function, cytokine release and phagocytosis it has designed a fully validated in vitro system.

Luca Cassetta PhD, co-founder and VP Immunology at Macomics said:

We have completed and validated gene knock down screenings (pooled and array) in iPS-derived cells in disease relevant models and also demonstrated that gene editing is scalable from single to genome wide.

In its in-house program, Macomics’ therapeutic strategy is to rescue microglia impaired lipid processing, clearance and has successfully reproduced the dysfunctional microglia phenotype associated with lipid loading.

Simon Dew, CBO of Macomics said:

We are now using our ENIGMAC platform for new target identification in neurodegeneration and neuroinflammation target discovery, as well as other disease areas, both in-house and in drug discovery partnerships.