On World Microbiome Day 2023, Hervé Affagard, CEO and co-founder of MaaT Pharma and Jeffrey Silber, Chief Medical Officer of Vedanta Biosciences delve into the current innovative landscape of microbiome-based therapeutics.

Riding on the momentum of the first faecal microbiota product approved for C. difficile in December 2022, the microbiome therapies space in 2023 has continued to see revolutionary developments and continued research advancement.

Recent developments in microbiome therapeutics

In May this year, first-in-human study interim results revealed that a CRISPR-based microbial gene therapy can “eliminate antibiotic-resistant E. coli strains in the gut”.

Notably, gut microbiome was found to linked to cancer CAR T therapy response, based data from the largest prospective study of its kind, published in Nature Medicine in March 2023.

This followed results from a large metagenomics study published in November 2022, in which gut microbiome was identified as a key part of Parkinson’s pathogenesis.

For World Microbiome Day on 27 June 2023, EPR put questions to Hervé Affagard, CEO and co-founder of MaaT Pharma and Jeffrey Silber, Chief Medical Officer of Vedanta Biosciences, to find out how the field is progressing and what innovations could transform future microbiome-based therapies. Based on current innovations, “this is the era of personalised medicine,” according to Silber.

What are the main challenges of developing microbiome therapies?

Hervé Affagard (HA): Developing microbiome therapeutics as well as every other new therapeutic modality comes with several challenges that need to be addressed carefully to ensure patient safety and maximise the potential benefits of these treatments. At MaaT Pharma our donor-derived products are made through pooling (ie, mixing multiple donors), thus achieving a higher overall richness and standardisation of the resulting drug product. A patented cryoprotectant ensures a high preservation and viability of the collected gut microbiota.

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