Given all the developed PD1 and PD-L1 antibodies we've developed, shouldn't it be quite plausible to make a dog or cat version? We know epitope isn't super important in this case and have a sense on where it should be effective. We have a ton of starting points We have dog biologics. Shouldn't dog keytruda be a relatively straightforward engineering problem?
Yes, it is. There's been a lot of M&A activity in the animal health field lately around developing antibody platforms for pets, so I think there's going to be much more effort around this idea. I think the main challenges right now are everything else around it:
1. Diagnosing canine cancer correctly (i.e. making sure lymphoma is actually diagnosed as lymphoma)
2. Identifying the correct biomarkers
3. Running cost-effective trials (which is complicated by 1&2)
4. Making sure the drug can be administered by general veterinarians to the average dog in a cost effective way (a challenge given that Keytruda is usually 30 minutes of IV)
Anyone who's serious about canine cancer is going to have to think about this. There's very little in the way of cancer infrastructure in the canine world as there is in the US.
An underrated market that I think is likely to be solved for pets first is lab-grown meat. Our standards, aesthetic and regulatory, for what pets eat are much lower than for humans. For instance, you don't have to worry nearly as much about differentiating cells because a cell slurry is what you want at the end anyway.
Interesting but it's tough to imagine the niche. There's been a lot of success recently in premium dog food, but that's usually sold with pictures of meadows and streams. I don't know if people would be willing to pay premiums for lab grown meat...
The AI dog's hand has five fingers. (As in, it has a fifth _non-thumb_ finger, under the money.) This would be more appropriate if it were a cat, what with feline polydactyly being so common.
> What pet owners want is a treatment that consistently and predictably treats anxiety and reactivity without any side effects.
This should really be handled by breeding - you only need about 15% heritability to be amenable to breeding moving a trait where you want it, and OCEAN traits are all roughly 2-4x that, so it shouldn't even take much more than 3-5 generations.
What's that? Most people don't buy pets from reputable breeders, they just end up with whatever random pets they find out in the world or in shelters? Instead of paying once for the thing you actually want, you'll just grab a pet at random, then pay a couple hundred a month forevermore to bludgeon the random pet's personality into the shape they want?
Sigh. Sounds about right.
I do agree we should definitely be doing things like massively parallel CRISPR on polygenic traits and embryo selection on pets to hone the technology. But where's the market, is the real problem. If people won't even pay for a well bred pet, and prefer randomly choosing then paying many multiples of that in monthly medicine payments, how are you ever going to persuade them to spend $10k to get exactly the dog / cat they want in appearance and temperament?
Given all the developed PD1 and PD-L1 antibodies we've developed, shouldn't it be quite plausible to make a dog or cat version? We know epitope isn't super important in this case and have a sense on where it should be effective. We have a ton of starting points We have dog biologics. Shouldn't dog keytruda be a relatively straightforward engineering problem?
Yes, it is. There's been a lot of M&A activity in the animal health field lately around developing antibody platforms for pets, so I think there's going to be much more effort around this idea. I think the main challenges right now are everything else around it:
1. Diagnosing canine cancer correctly (i.e. making sure lymphoma is actually diagnosed as lymphoma)
2. Identifying the correct biomarkers
3. Running cost-effective trials (which is complicated by 1&2)
4. Making sure the drug can be administered by general veterinarians to the average dog in a cost effective way (a challenge given that Keytruda is usually 30 minutes of IV)
Anyone who's serious about canine cancer is going to have to think about this. There's very little in the way of cancer infrastructure in the canine world as there is in the US.
An underrated market that I think is likely to be solved for pets first is lab-grown meat. Our standards, aesthetic and regulatory, for what pets eat are much lower than for humans. For instance, you don't have to worry nearly as much about differentiating cells because a cell slurry is what you want at the end anyway.
see https://www.biocraftpet.com/ !
Interesting but it's tough to imagine the niche. There's been a lot of success recently in premium dog food, but that's usually sold with pictures of meadows and streams. I don't know if people would be willing to pay premiums for lab grown meat...
The AI dog's hand has five fingers. (As in, it has a fifth _non-thumb_ finger, under the money.) This would be more appropriate if it were a cat, what with feline polydactyly being so common.
> What pet owners want is a treatment that consistently and predictably treats anxiety and reactivity without any side effects.
This should really be handled by breeding - you only need about 15% heritability to be amenable to breeding moving a trait where you want it, and OCEAN traits are all roughly 2-4x that, so it shouldn't even take much more than 3-5 generations.
What's that? Most people don't buy pets from reputable breeders, they just end up with whatever random pets they find out in the world or in shelters? Instead of paying once for the thing you actually want, you'll just grab a pet at random, then pay a couple hundred a month forevermore to bludgeon the random pet's personality into the shape they want?
Sigh. Sounds about right.
I do agree we should definitely be doing things like massively parallel CRISPR on polygenic traits and embryo selection on pets to hone the technology. But where's the market, is the real problem. If people won't even pay for a well bred pet, and prefer randomly choosing then paying many multiples of that in monthly medicine payments, how are you ever going to persuade them to spend $10k to get exactly the dog / cat they want in appearance and temperament?
"Merck, the makers of Keytruda, can’t provide a lower cost version of Keytruda themselves without cannibalizing their human sales" why?
Because people will just take the cheaper version and insurance will wonder why they're paying for the more expensive version.