Antibody and antibody mimetic immunotherapeutics
Immunotherapy is an approach to treating disease that relies on controlling the immune system. Immunotherapeutics are classified as either suppression immunotherapeutics, which reduce the immune response, or activation immunotherapeutics, which elicit the immune system to seek out and destroy diseased cells. Immunotherapy emerged as a field and therapeutic strategy with the development and administration of immune system suppressing small-molecule drugs (e.g., azathioprine, FK506, cyclosporin A and rapamycin). As immune system suppressants, these drugs have been used to treat inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, as well as to suppress rejection following organ transplant. Today, immunotherapeutics continue to be used to treat a multitude...