Other

D&eacute;sir&eacute; Jos&eacute; Collen

Stefan Janssens

Olivier Henry Varenne

A catheter containing an inflatable balloon, which is at its periphery provided with hollow extensions that communicate between the outside of the balloon and the lumen of the catheter for use in the gene therapeutic treatment of local disorders by transfer of a desired gene to a target cell or tissue being part of or being located in the vicinity of a blood vessel. The catheter is preferably the Infiltrator&reg; catheter.

Gene therapeutic treatment of blood vessel associated disorders

Methods for the identification, production and use of staphylokinase derivatives characterized by a reduced immunogenicity after administration in patients. The derivatives of the invention are obtained by preparing a DNA fragment comprising at least the part of the coding sequence of staphylokinase that provides for its biological activity; performing in vitro site-directed mutagenesis on the DNA fragment to replace one or more codons for wild-type amino acids by a codon for another amino acid; cloning the mutated DNA fragment in a suitable vector; transforming or transfecting a suitable host cell with the vector; culturing the host cell under conditions suitable for expressing the DNA fragment; and purifying the expressed staphylokinase derivative to homogeneity. Preferably the DNA fragment is a 453 bp EcoRI-HindIII fragment of the plasmid pMEX602sakB, (pMEX.SakSTAR), the in vitro site-directed mutagenesis is performed by spliced overlap extension polymerase chain reaction and the mutated DNA fragment is expressed in strain TG1 or WK6. The invention also relates to pharmaceutical compositions comprising at least one of the staphylokinase derivatives according to the invention together with a suitable excipient, for treatment of arterial thrombosis.

Growing community of inventors

Winksele, Belgium

Désiré José Collen

Growing community of inventors

Winksele, Belgium

D&eacute;sir&eacute; Jos&eacute; Collen

Désiré José Collen