Phase I and pharmacokinetic studies of CYT-6091, a novel PEGylated colloidal gold-rhTNF nanomedicine.

Purpose: A novel nanomedicine, CYT-6091, constructed by simultaneously binding recombinant human tumor necrosis factor alpha (rhTNF) and thiolyated polyethylene glycol to the surface of 27-nm colloidal gold particles, was tested in a phase I dose escalation clinical trial in advanced stage cancer patients.

Experimental Design: CYT-6091, whose dosing was based on the amount of rhTNF in the nanomedicine, was injected intravenously, and 1 cycle of treatment consisted of 2 treatments administered 14 days apart.

Results: Doses from 50 μg/m(2) to 600 μg/m(2) were well tolerated, and no maximum tolerated dose (MTD) was reached, as the highest dose exceeded the target dosage of 1-mg rhTNF per treatment, exceeding the previous MTD for native rhTNF by 3-fold.

Immune activation and IL-12 production during acute/early HIV infection in the absence and presence of highly active, antiretroviral therapy.

Suppressed IL-12 production and maladaptive immune activation, both of which are ameliorated by successful highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART), are thought to play important roles in the immunopathogenesis of chronic HIV infection. Despite the important effects of the immunological and virological events of early HIV infection on subsequent disease progression, IL-12 production and immune activation in early infection remain under-defined. To quantify IL-12 production and immune activation during acute/early HIV infection, in the presence and absence of HAART, we performed a prospective, longitudinal study of participants in the Baltimore site of the Acute Infection and Early Disease Research Program, with cross-sectional comparison to healthy control subjects.

Modulation of the IL-12/IFN-gamma axis by IFN-alpha therapy for hepatitis C.

Although IFN-alpha forms the foundation of therapy for chronic hepatitis C, only a minority of patients has a sustained response to IFN-alpha alone. The antiviral activities of IFN-alpha formed the rationale for its use in viral hepatitis. However, IFN-alpha and the other Type I IFNs are also pleiotropic immune regulators.

Interferon-beta therapy for multiple sclerosis induces reciprocal changes in interleukin-12 and interleukin-10 production.

Interleukin-12 is critical to the pathogenesis of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis in multiple species. Interleukin-10, a dominant endogenous inhibitor of interleukin-12, is largely protective in these experimental surrogates for multiple sclerosis. Such data have suggested that an interleukin-12/interleukin-10 immunoregulatory circuit is a key determinant of disease expression in experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis.