Summary:
Kaleidos Pharma is developing a family of naturally occurring cytokines, including its lead product, TGF alpha, for GI mucositis and for therapy of Parkinson's disease.
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Description (Web site quote):
he TGF alpha family is defined by a particular amino acid and structural motif, CX7CX4CX10CXCX8C, which forms three characteristic intramolecular disulfide bonds: C1-C3, C2-C4 and C5-C6 that result in three loops. The correct pairing and integrity of each of these disulfide links is required for full activity. Biological activity occurs through binding to the erbB gene family of receptors. Cytokines included within our intellectual property that have this structural motif are TGF alpha, amphiregulin, betacellulin and heparin-binding EGF.

TGF alpha is a small protein consisting of 50 amino acids. It does not contain carbohydrate or other post-translational modifications and is thus amenable to manufacturing using a variety of methods including bacterial fermentation or by chemical synthesis. A stylized structure indicating the receptor binding loop 3 is shown in the following figure.
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