Gastrobody Therapeutics


Programme

Pre-Accelerate Cambridge

Sector

Healthcare/Pharma/Biotech


Gastrobody Therapeutics is a biotechnology company creating ultrastable protein therapeutics to treat conditions of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. Essentially, we aim to develop antibodies that you can eat. Our ground-breaking technology harnesses the evolved capability of certain plant proteins to survive the harsh conditions of the stomach and small intestine. We produce binders that are much more stable than conventional antibodies for oral administration against GI diseases with major unmet medical need.

The most urgent challenges for GI delivery include inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and coeliac disease. IBD affects 32 million people worldwide with a therapeutic market of $24 billion, being often poorly controlled by current treatments. Coeliac disease affects 80 million people worldwide and has no effective treatments apart from a life-long gluten-free diet. Gastrobodies have the potential to be transformative against these GI diseases by leveraging their exquisite specificity to the target and their unique ability to survive the harsh conditions within the GI tract.

Founding team

Yasunori Watanabe

Yasunori is a scientist passionate about developing novel therapeutic platforms and translating scientific ideas into real world applications.

He has previously worked at AstraZeneca and Sanofi, on projects ranging from early-stage candidates to clinical-phase drugs. Most recently, he led the Analytical Sciences team at Sanofi and was the developability lead, responsible for selecting the best candidates to progress into clinical trials.

As a member of the scientific steering committee, he also explored partnerships and collaborations at the academia-industry interface. He has worked in life science consulting with experience in buy-side commercial due diligence.

He completed his DPhil in Biochemistry at the University of Oxford, investigating how viruses exploit host-cell machinery to evade the immune system. This work led to the first characterisation of the glycan shield of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein which informed vaccine construct design.

He also led a multi-institute study into the biophysical nature of the Spike protein derived from the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine.

He has authored 30+ publications in world-leading journals such as Science, Cell, and Nature Communications. He was awarded the 2020 Early Career Researcher Award by Elsevier with the US-UK Fulbright Commission. He is also an adjunct fellow at the University of Southampton.

Ana Rossi

Ana completed her PhD at Cambridge University in 2007. Since then, she has conducted research at the Department of Pharmacology, University of Cambridge and has taught Natural Sciences at Queens’ College, where she is a Fellow. Ana spent much of her early career focusing on fundamental mechanisms of cell signalling.

Her work solved a long standing open question on quantal calcium release, namely the ability of cells to orchestrate graded calcium responses. While addressing basic questions, Ana also nurtured her passion for developing new technologies. She developed a novel fluorescent polarisation assay which has been applied in the most diverse areas.

More recently, Ana’s focus developed towards the translational research arena. She instigated a new line of investigation to understand how glioblastoma cells invade through the patient’s brain and validating novel drug targets to prevent invasion. Through this work, Ana developed an interest in the field of biologics.

She then joined the Howarth lab, where she is currently advancing the gastrobody platform full-time.

Ana held prestigious fellowships and grants to support her independent research and has published 30+ articles in top journals (including Nature, PNAS and Nature Chemical Biology).

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