Anti-pyroglutamate-3 Aβ immunotherapy engages microglia and inhibits amyloid accumulation in transgenic mouse models of Aβ amyloidosis

Alzheimer disease (AD) is the most common form of dementia affecting more than 6 million people in the United States. Currently, 3 monospecific antibodies targeting different Amyloid β (Aβ) species have been approved by the US FDA as disease modifying therapeutics for treatment in early AD patients with amyloid pathology. ABBV-916 is a clinical stage human IgG1 monoclonal antibody which binds to N-terminal truncated, pyroglutamate-modified at amino acid position 3, Aβ (Aβ_pE3). The current study characterized ABBV-916 using human tissue samples and amyloid precursor protein (APP) transgenic mice. ABBV-916 selectively bound to recombinant Aβ_pE3-42 fibrils and native amyloid plaques in unfixed AD brain tissue but did not bind targets in human CSF. ABBV-916 significantly reduced dense plaques from brain tissue that were co-cultured with hiPSC-derived phagocytes. In APPPS1-21 mice, ABBV‑916 bound plaques in a dose-dependent manner after a single intravenous injection. In addition, three months of weekly administration of ABBV-916 murine surrogate antibody significantly decreased amyloid plaques in APPPS1-21 mice. In vivo two-photon imaging revealed that the murine version of ABBV-916 inhibited the growth of the plaques in APPPS1-21 mice. ABBV-916 murine surrogate antibody recruited microglia to plaques within 24-48 hours after a single intraperitoneal injection in Cx3cr1-tdTomato/APPPS1-21 mice. Importantly, in contrast to a positive control antibody, ABBV‑916 murine precursor antibody did not cause microhemorrhage in aged APPPS1-21 mice. Taken together, our results suggest that ABBV-916 is a promising drug candidate. Clinical testing is on-going to evaluate the plaque removal and safety profiles of ABBV-916 in AD patients.