CBT is an early-stage biotech spinout with a proprietary pipeline and technology platform focused on unique aspects of B cell biology that are involved in regulating a variety of autoimmune diseases and inflammatory immune responses.  Through this technology, CBT has the unprecedented ability to expand human B cells ex vivo for use as an autologous cellular immunotherapy, and to apply this technology for the treatment of immunodeficiency.  Additional technologies also exist for depleting B cells subsets in vivo for cancer immunotherapy and potentially vaccine development without destroying other essential B cells and their protective functions.

For the last 30 years, therapeutic intervention for immunological diseases has focused on T cells. However, the importance of B cells during the development and clinical management of disease has recently become obvious.  B cells are central to autoimmunity and immune responses to pathogens, but they have recently been shown to serve critical positive and negative regulatory functions during immune responses.  Therefore, B cell manipulation can inhibit immune responses, or can hasten and enhance immune responses.  This unexpected duality of functions is explained by the identification of a potent regulatory B cell subset that dramatically attenuates T cell immune responses and autoimmunity through their ability to secrete IL-10. The importance of these cells has been demonstrated in mouse models of inflammation, autoimmunity, infection and lymphoma, but they will likely have even broader applications for the treatment of other cancers, diabetes, asthma, congenital and acquired immunodeficiency, and vaccine development.