AlgoNomics to address T-cell epitope identification for Asia

The Epibase® platform extension allows the development of vaccines and therapeutic proteins optimized for both the Western and the Asian continents.

Ghent, Belgium, May 17, 2005 - AlgoNomics NV today announces the extension of its Epibase® platform for T-cell epitope identification to cover the Asian HLA types. Epibase® now addresses all major HLA Class-II subtypes addressing both the Western and Asian population groups. “To date, most T-cell epitope identification platforms focus on the major HLA subtypes in the Caucasian population. AlgoNomics is committed to identify T-cell epitopes for a global market, and is the first to market a specific epitope identification platform for the major Asian population groups,” comments Ignace Lasters, CEO and CSO of the company.

Epibase® allows the optimization of therapeutic proteins and antibodies. It also allows improved product development in the vaccine field.

Dr. Lasters adds: “Our continuous investment in structural bioinformatics research and development, allowed us to expand our platform with those HLA subtypes that have a high incidence in countries such as China, India, Indonesia and Japan. The complete Epibase® platform is now able to identify helper epitopes in 62 distinct groups of HLA Class-II alleles, and 12 HLA Class-I alleles.”

Epibase® epitope profiling services are accessible through collaborations.

About Epibase®
Epibase® is AlgoNomics’ proprietary platform for T-cell epitope identification. This epitope dicovery is applied to vaccine development in the cancer and infectious diseases field, as well as to protein epitope profiling and Immunotuning®.

The uniqueness of Epibase® resides in its capability to identify all T-cell epitopes for any collection of proteins from any biological source (viral, cancer or other), for all HLA types covering most of the human population. The approach allows to document and optimize leads such as vaccines and therapeutic proteins for any specific population.

Unlike learning-based methods, Epibase® can identify epitopes for those HLA sub-types for which little or no experimental data is available. In addition, Epibase® has the intrinsic capacity to identify epitopes sequence patterns that would not be recognized by learning-based tools.

About AlgoNomics
AlgoNomics is a Belgium based biotech company that provides structural bioinformatics services to develop rationally designed therapeutics in the broad field of immunotherapy. AlgoNomics offers in silico support to companies that develop rationally designed vaccines and therapeutic proteins.
AlgoNomics owns a rich, proprietary platform for structure-based protein and peptide design. The technology platform contains biologically validated, innovative tools, which have been developed in-house.
AlgoNomics’ premier product is the Epibase® platform for T-cell epitope identification in different population groups.
The company is serving a broad range of customers including Ablynx, Bayer Cropscience, Genmab and J&J Tibotec.
For more information about AlgoNomics visit www.algonomics.com

Further Information
AlgoNomics N.V.
ir. Philippe Stas
COO
Technologiepark 4
B-9052 Gent – Belgium
Tel.: +32.(0)496.55.30.06
Fax.: +32.(0)9.241.11.02
Philippe.Stas@algonomics.com

Epibase® and Immunotuning® are trademarks of AlgoNomics NV.