ESMO Immuno-Oncology 2025 | Armed oncolytic viruses for treating pancreatic ductal carcinoma

Yes, so in this study, we have used a virus to introduce immunostimulatory genes directly into the tumor microenvironment to really change the immune hostile environment to become more friendly to T-cell and expand the tumor-reactive T-cells in the patients. And these viruses that we are using, they can also replicate in the tumor to cause oncolysis. So that’s why they are also called oncolytic viruses. So that is sort of the study we will be describing during this presentation. So the virus we are using is an adenoviral vector that is designed to express these genes called CD40 ligand and 4-1BB ligand. And they are really driving T-cell responses to attack the tumor and also to create a memory against these tumor cells. So we have done two trials where we have been using this type of product in pancreatic cancer. One study was done in the US called the LUCON001, which had two study arms. And in one of them, we combined this virus with standard-of-care chemotherapy. And in the other arm, we also added something called the checkpoint blockade antibody. And in the study that was done in Sweden, we have tested this viral product together with also chemotherapy. We have tested it both for patients as first-line, so the first treatment you get for systemic cancer that has spread and metastasized. And we have also tested it for patients that have received previous treatments. So we have tried to figure out how to best use this product in different pancreatic cancer groups of patients. So the data we will present during the meeting is, first of all, how the virus looked like, the preclinical data that sort of made us understand how it works and that it actually works as we hoped and so on. And then we will go into some of the clinical studies. Most will be focused on the virus in combination with chemotherapy because those data are partly published and some still unpublished, but we are not allowed yet from the company who owns the product to reveal the data where we combine it with checkpoint blockade antibodies because that study is still being reported. So we are really happy at least to be able to show some of the clinical data. So what we have seen so far is that the product seemed to reduce the tumor load in the patients. And if you compare to historical data, that’s the only thing you can compare to when you do a phase one, two study, because then you are usually not in a phase where you do randomized studies against the control arm. But if we compare to historical controls, it looks like survival is longer than what you would expect for chemotherapy, for example. So this is holding promise for the future. And we are actually planning now for a pivotal registration trial. So we will show perhaps a little bit how that one will be designed. And hopefully, there will be a lot of interested universities in Europe and in the US that want to participate to test if this product could actually be something that is approved for pancreatic cancer in the future.

This transcript is AI-generated. While we strive for accuracy, please verify this copy with the video.