The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Dec. 21, 2004
Filed:
Jun. 22, 2000
Carol H. Pontzer, Silver Spring, MD (US);
Lynnette H. Shorts, Silver Spring, MD (US);
Christina Dancz Clark, Cambridge, MA (US);
University of Maryland, College Park, MD (US);
Abstract
The present invention is directed to the field of animal and human health, and more particularly to pharmacological uses of analogs or mutants of interferon-tau (IFN-&tgr;) that differ from native IFN-&tgr; because of substitutions of amino acids near the amino terminus of the IFN-&tgr; molecule that impart improved biological activity. The IFN-&tgr; mutants described in this disclosure have low toxicity, retain the same or slightly reduced antiviral activity compared with highly effective IFN-alpha, and have enhanced antiproliferative activity compared to native IFN-tau, making them useful in treating viral infections, cancer, and immune system diseases including autoimmune diseases. The present invention is also directed to a method for making novel recombinant proteins, especially interferons, interleukins, and cytokines, polypeptide hormones and other biopharmaceuticals that have improved biological activity over known proteins and/or lower toxicity and/or increased stability.