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Title: Asthma Treatment: Scientists Clone Eotaxin Receptors
URL: http://www.pslgroup.com/dg/9B2E.htm
Doctor's Guide
June 28, 1996

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., June 28, 1996 -- LeukoSite Inc. today announced that scientists at LeukoSite, Children's Hospital, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Beth Israel Hospital and Harvard Medical School have cloned the human receptor for eotaxin, one of a family of chemical signals that direct the immune response. The eotaxin receptor is found on a subset of white blood cells called eosinophils, which are thought to be responsible for the tissue damage that occurs in allergic inflammatory diseases such as asthma. The research was reported in the June issue of the Journal of Experimental Medicine.

The eotaxin receptor, named CKR-3, is one of a family of recently discovered "chemokine" receptors found on leukocytes (white blood cells), the study's authors report. Chemokines and chemokine receptors make up part of the signalling system which enables leukocytes to home in on the site of inflammation or injury. Blocking the interaction between eotaxin and its
receptor, the authors theorize, may offer a new way to treat eosinophil-related inflammatory diseases, such as asthma.

In February, LeukoSite announced that scientists at LeukoSite, Harvard Medical School and the University of British Columbia had cloned the gene for human eotaxin, the chemokine itself.

In an accompanying commentary in the June issue of the Journal of Experimental Medicine, eotaxin and its CKR-3 receptor were described as "exceedingly attractive targets for therapeutic intervention in allergic diseases."

The study reported an unusual characteristic of the eotaxin receptor: CKR-3 is restricted to one cell type -- eosinophils --, where it is found in high concentration. This and the selectivity of eotaxin for its receptor led the authors to suggest that the receptor "provides a potential mechanism for the selective recruitment and migration of eosinophils within tissues."

The strong correlation between eosinophil recruitment and tissue damage in allergic inflammatory diseases, such as asthma, led the authors to suggest that eotaxin receptor antagonists "may have therapeutic value."

LeukoSite is a privately held biopharmaceutical company that is working on strategies to treat chronic inflammatory and autoimmune disease by blocking cellular- and tissue-specific leukocyte migration.

CONTACT: Christopher Mirabelli, Ph.D. of LeukoSite Inc., 617-621-9350, ext. 1050; or Douglas Johnson, Ph.D. of GreenTree Communications, 800-428-8796

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