MAbImprove

Abstract

In the context of the “Grand Loan,”1 also known as the “Investment for the Future” program, the French government launched a call in 2010 to identify already renowned laboratories proposing a unifying and ambitious project covering basic science, training and technological transfer. The idea was to provide substantial financial support over an unusually long period (10 y), which would allow them the opportunity to capitalize on their initial research potential, with an expected economic return on investment. To sum up the spirit of this call, the French government named it “Laboratoires d’excellence” (LabEx). Although the call was initially focused on local initiatives, e.g., research groups on the same university campus in major cities, it was also open to projects including several universities. Dedicated to therapeutic antibodies, MAbImprove is a bipolar LabEx that gathers 14 academic research teams from Tours and Montpellier.2 It is based on a partnership between the Universities of Tours and Montpellier, associated with the Inserm (Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale), the CNRS (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique), the INRA (Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique), the University Hospital of Tours and the Comprehensive Cancer Hospital of Montpellier (ICM). It is also based on a national network headed by one of us in Tours (H. Watier), and it gathers academic teams and pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies involved in therapeutic antibody research,3 the latter being directly interested in the benefits of the MAbImprove project. Academic teams from Tours have a nice complementarity with those from Montpellier, particularly the “Institut de Recherche en Cancerologie de Montpellier” (IRCM)4 and the IMGT®’s lab and its antibody nomenclature.5 The MAbImprove LabEx was selected in March 2011 by an international jury at the first round of the LabEx call and was officially inaugurated in October 2011. MAbImprove’s project on the current clinical use of therapeutic antibodies is based on the idea that their use can still be improved and that the clinical “model” still holds many secrets to be disclosed (“from bedside to bench” approach) and exploited to aid development of new and improved antibodies (“from bench to bedside” approach is classically used in pharmaceutical industry). Thus, MAbImprove’s motto is “improved antibodies with an improved development and an improved use.” MAbImprove is organized in five workpackages (WP) logically starting from clinical pharmacology (WP1), then experimental pharmacokinetics (WP2) and pharmacodynamics (WP3) to new targets evaluation (WP4) and innovative technologies (WP5). A supplementary WP is dedicated to training, from technicians to PhD and beyond.