Live at #ADPD2026 in Copenhagen this morning, Prof. catherine mummery’s oral presentation was buzzing as ImmunoBrain unveiled the first clinical data for IBC-Ab002, a newly engineered proprietary antibody targeting an inhibitory immune checkpoint pathway and specifically tailored for Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative disorders. The Phase 1b data show that IBC-Ab002 has a favorable safety and tolerability profile, which combined with the observed directionally favorable changes in disease-related biomarkers, support the continued clinical advancement of this potentially disease-modifying therapeutic candidate. Learn more in our press release: https://lnkd.in/dcSYhcXE
ImmunoBrain
Biotechnology Research
New York, NY 1,672 followers
Developing novel therapies that target the peripheral immune system to drive brain repair in neurodegenerative diseases
About us
ImmunoBrain is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company transforming the fight against neurodegeneration and aging by targeting the immune system, restoring brain immune communications and boosting natural repair mechanisms. ImmunoBrain’s lead program is a proprietary antibody targeting the inhibitory immune checkpoint pathway PD-1/PD-L1, to treat Alzheimer's disease. ImmunoBrain's novel approach for the treatment of neurodegeneration is based on years of innovative, cutting-edge scientific discoveries made in the lab of Prof. Michal Schwartz at the Weizmann Institute of Science.
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https://www.immunobrain.com/
External link for ImmunoBrain
- Industry
- Biotechnology Research
- Company size
- 11-50 employees
- Headquarters
- New York, NY
- Type
- Privately Held
- Founded
- 2015
Locations
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New York, NY, US
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3 Pekeris street
Rehovot, IL
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Updates
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The ImmunoBrain team is heading to #ADPD2026 in Copenhagen. We are proud to share that Phase 1b data for IBC-Ab002, a newly engineered proprietary antibody targeting an inhibitory immune checkpoint pathway and specifically tailored for Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative disorders, will be featured in an oral presentation by Professor catherine mummery. 📌 Session Name: Mechanistic Modifiers of AD: APOE, Immunity, and Neural Circuits 📄 Title: PD-L1 Immune Checkpoint Blockade in Early Alzheimer's Disease: Topline Results from the Phase 1b IBC-01-01 Study (ID 2979) 🗓 Date and Time: Thursday, March 19, 2026, 8:55 a.m. CET 📍 Location: Hall 180-181 If you plan to attend, we look forward to connecting! For the press release: https://lnkd.in/dTA_Ppe3
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🧪 A new paper published in Molecular Psychiatry (Yoon et al., 2025) brings a valuable clinical perspective to a question we often hear in the field: how can modulating the peripheral immune response relate to brain function and cognition in humans? One way to modulate immune function is to block the PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitory immune checkpoint, an approach that has revolutionized the treatment of many cancers. The authors performed a systematic review + meta-analysis across 40 studies. On the clinical side, they analyzed randomized cancer trials where PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors were used - representing thousands of patients: ➡️ Across ~6,970 participants (16 RCTs), PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitor use was associated with a lower risk of meaningful cognitive decline. ➡️ Across ~13,084 participants (25 RCTs), treatment was associated with improved cognitive function scores vs control arms. The authors also report the signal was more consistent beyond ~2 months of treatment, and remained significant in analyses of trials with older populations. 🧠 While these are oncology trials (not Alzheimer’s trials), with non-AD populations and cognitive measures that differ from those typically used in AD studies, we’re encouraged to see large-scale human data continuing to connect the immune checkpoint pathway with cognition. At ImmunoBrain, IBC-Ab002 - our novel anti-PD-L1 antibody - is designed to engage the peripheral immune system to support immune-mediated clearance of brain pathology, and is being developed specifically for neurodegenerative disorders with the goal of supporting an appropriate safety profile for elderly populations. We’re excited to see independent, peer-reviewed research that supports this neuroimmune paradigm, and we look forward to advancing immune-based strategies for brain health. Read the paper here: https://lnkd.in/dB3-4-Ty #Neuroimmunology #ClinicalResearch #Immunotherapy #Biotech #BrainHealth #Alzheimers
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👏 We are pleased to announce the completion of the last patient visit in ImmunoBrain’s first-in-human Phase 1b clinical study of our proprietary PD-L1-targeting antibody, IBC-Ab002, in people with Alzheimer’s disease. This novel therapy is based on the breakthrough research of our Co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer Michal Schwartz, Ph.D. and her team at the Weizmann Institute of Science around the role of the immune system in brain repair. In this 48-week, placebo-controlled trial, participants received four doses of IBC-Ab002 or placebo distributed across five ascending dose cohorts at 12-week intervals, with the aim of evaluating safety, tolerability, pharmacokinetic and exploratory pharmacodynamic effects of our IBC-Ab002. We look forward to sharing results from this study in 2026, and extend our sincere thanks to the participants and their families, as well as to the investigators, study site teams, and our collaborators for their commitment and partnership throughout the trial. Information on this clinical trial can be found here: https://lnkd.in/dKN6vD8q Learn more about ImmunoBrain: https://immunobrain.com/
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ImmunoBrain is heading to #SfN25 in San Diego next month! We’re proud to share that Dr. Alexander Kertser, Head of Pipeline and Discovery, will be presenting our latest research on Immune checkpoint blockade as a therapeutic approach in Huntington’s Disease. If you’re attending the Society for Neuroscience 2025 conference, come visit our poster at the Huntington’s Disease: Preclinical Studies session to learn more about our findings, ask questions, and connect over advancing Huntington’s disease therapeutics. 📍 Where: San Diego Convention Center, CA 🗓 When: Tuesday, November 18th, 8:00 AM - 12:00 PM Looking forward to seeing you there! #HuntingtonsResearch #HuntingtonsDisease
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👏 We are excited to welcome internationally renowned physician-scientist Dr. Francis S. Collins to the ImmunoBrain board of directors. 🔬 Dr. Collins served as the 16th director of the National Institutes of Health under three United States presidents. In this role, he guided the nation's biomedical research, from basic science to clinical trials, as well as a historic series of research partnerships that included addressing Alzheimer's disease, cancer, precision health, neuroscience, and COVID-19. In addition, Dr. Collins led an active research group at the University of Michigan and the NIH for 41 years, doing groundbreaking research on type 2 diabetes and discovering the gene misspellings that cause cystic fibrosis, Huntington's disease, progeria, and several other disorders. A former director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, Dr. Collins coordinated an international consortium of laboratories as part of the Human Genome Project to produce the first complete sequence of the human DNA instruction book in 2003. He has been recognized for his many contributions to science, medicine, and society with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the National Medal of Science, and the Templeton Prize. Reflecting on his career as a researcher, Dr. Collins shared that addressing Alzheimer's disease remains a top personal priority and one of the greatest medical challenges and opportunities of our time. "This is a condition that has been a source of great suffering for individuals and their families. Alzheimer's disease needs attention, new ideas, and progress," said Dr. Collins. "Much of the effort over the last 30 years has been focused on amyloid and tau, and that approach has made progress—but other insights are needed to develop truly effective therapeutics. Rigorous analysis of genetic risk factors for Alzheimer's disease has revealed a number of signals pointing to the immune system. This seems to be a clue to something fundamental about the condition that might lead to insights about treatment. When I heard about the work that Professor Michal Schwartz has been doing for over two decades—looking at the role of the immune system and inflammation, and coming up with some very intriguing treatment interventions based upon careful, peer-reviewed experiments done in mice—this seemed like it might be one of the answers we've been looking for. By joining the board of ImmunoBrain, I hope I can help us get those answers." ➡️ Read more: https://lnkd.in/df-a4Ufp
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🔬 Our latest study analyses the therapeutic effects of our PD-L1 blocking approach in the PS19 mouse model; a rapidly advancing model of tauopathy. Here, we report that a single injection of our treatment significantly improved cognitive performance in the mice, which was detectable 1-month post-treatment, along with a transient decrease in phosphorylated and total tau in the brain and cerebrospinal fluid, respectively, 14 days post-treatment. These findings are in-line with our own and others' previous findings demonstrating therapeutic effects of anti-PD-1/PD-L1 antibodies in mouse models of Alzheimer’s disease and tauopathies. ✅ ImmunoBrain is currently testing this approach in the clinic with the investigational drug IBC-Ab002, a fully human anti-PD-L1 antibody engineered for treating neurodegeneration in Alzheimer’s disease.
On the Importance of Model Selection in Drug Testing For many human diseases, there are no true mouse equivalents. To still evaluate drug effectiveness in a complex, living organism, scientists have learned to engineer animal models that mimic selected aspects of human pathology. In essence, we take a mouse, deliberately disrupt one of its proteins, then “fix” it with a drug that restores what we just broke - and celebrate that we’ve cured the disease. Two major issues arise from this approach. First, such models often become benchmarks for drug testing despite capturing only a narrow mechanistic slice of the human condition. Treatments that look miraculous in mice frequently yield limited benefit in people. Second, these models are poorly suited for evaluating drugs that act through entirely different pathways and do not directly target the artificially overexpressed protein. In our recent bioRxiv preprint, ImmunoBrain tested an anti-PD-L1 blocking antibody in the PS19 mouse line - a tauopathy model that overexpresses mutated human tau (P301S). Unlike slower-progressing amyloid or tau models, PS19 mice develop rapidly advancing neurodegeneration with early mortality. Importantly, anti-PD-L1 does not target tau itself; it works by modulating immune activity in the periphery, which in turn supports natural repair processes within the CNS, regardless of the primary disease etiology. In previous studies using slower progressing mouse models of tauopathy, PD-L1 blockade was shown to ameliorate cognitive decline alongside sustained reductions in in pathological tau species. In contrast, in the aggressive PS19 model, while we observed a significant beneficial effect on cognitive performance, the effects on pathological tau were short-lived. This outcome aligns with the notion that a treatment that does not directly counteract the main driver of the model - in this case, massive tau overexpression – may be at a relative disadvantage in maintaining a long-lasting effect following a single dose. Our findings underscore how model kinetics can influence therapeutic outcomes and highlight the importance of calibrating treatment regimens accordingly. In humans, disease evolves over years rather than weeks, and this temporal difference is routinely considered during clinical translation. A similar awareness should guide comparisons between preclinical models. Careful interpretation is therefore essential - across models, not all “positive” or “negative” results are created equal. https://lnkd.in/dRgAYveA #Innovation #Biotech #HealthcareInnovation #TranslationalResearch #Neurodegeneration #DrugDiscovery #Neuroimmunology
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👏 We are delighted to welcome Dr. Rochelle Walensky to the ImmunoBrain Board of Directors. Dr. Walensky is a distinguished physician-scientist whose career spans infectious disease clinical practice, research, and policy. She served as the 19th director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), was chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Massachusetts General Hospital and is currently a professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. "I am truly inspired by Professor Michal Schwartz's pioneering discoveries related to the brain-immune relationship and her groundbreaking approach to treating neurodegeneration by targeting neuroinflammation," said Dr. Walensky. "Almost everyone has been either directly or indirectly touched by dementia. With the aging population expected to triple over the next few decades, I am deeply engaged in understanding the far-reaching implications of this trend. The potential public health impact of neurodegenerative diseases represents one of the most pressing challenges of our time." Read more: https://lnkd.in/dCYctjXv
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📢 Check out our latest study exploring the immune response to anti-PD-L1 antibody! 🔬 A step toward personalized immunotherapy across cancer, neurodegeneration, and beyond. #Immunotherapy #ImmuneModeling #PersonalizedMedicine #CheckpointInhibitors #Neuroimmunology #MachineLearning
Excited to share our newest publication! 🔍📄 Can we predict - before treatment begins - whether someone will mount an effective immune response to checkpoint inhibitors? Our team at ImmunoBrain, in collaboration with Uri Nevo’s group at Tel Aviv University, investigated a specific aspect of this question using an agent-based modelling (ABM) approach. We focused on modelling the dose-response kinetics of immune cells stimulated with anti-PD-L1 antibody in an autologous mixed lymphocyte reaction (MLR) setting. These real-world experimental data, spanning 4–5 days of MLR co-culture, were then used to simulate virtual MLR experiments in Cell Studio, an ABM-based platform. We asked whether individual baseline immune features - like PD-1 expression on T cells or PD-L1 levels on monocytes - could predict the trajectory of the MLR immune response. Despite the small cohort size, the ABM approach accurately recapitulated the MLR-derived immune responses with a relatively high >80% predicative accuracy. Ultimately, such personalized modelling approaches could help stratify patients prior to immunotherapy across a range of diseases - from cancer to neurodegeneration - where mounting a beneficial immune response is key to therapeutic success. Big credit to Omri Matalon (PhD) and Avner Priel for leading this project, and to the team: Shai Braiman, MSc., M.B.A, Anat Geiger Maor, Andrea Perissinotto, Ella Wilczynski, Eti Yoles, Uri Nevo 📄 Learn more: https://lnkd.in/dVScc5NU
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📢 We’re pleased to share exciting new research from the laboratory of Professor Michal Schwartz at the Weizmann Institute of Science, our Chief Scientific Officer and co-founder, recently published in #NatureCommunications! 🔬 In this important study, Prof. Schwartz and her team examined individuals genetically predisposed to Early Onset Alzheimer’s disease, discovering that the peripheral immune cells of these individuals exhibit significant metabolic impairment even prior to symptom onset. Improving the metabolic function of peripheral immune cells by targeting CD38 resulted in enhanced memory performance in preclinical models, further linking peripheral immune activity and Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathology. These findings support the growing evidence that rejuvenating and harnessing the peripheral immune system could restore immune dysfunction observed in aging and AD. This aligns with ImmunoBrain’s therapeutic approach, to treat AD and other neurodegenerative conditions. 👏 Congratulations to Prof. Schwartz, Javier M. Peralta Ramos, Tommaso Croese, and the entire team on this significant contribution to Alzheimer’s research! Read the full article here: https://lnkd.in/dNgxcJMw #Alzheimers #AgingResearch #ImmunoBrain