For the First Time, a Glioma ¨C Brain Cancer ¨C may be Eliminated by a Chinese Research/Medical Team, Using a Novel Stem Cell Based Therapy of Cellonis Biotech, Beijing

BEIJING, Dec. 17 /PRNewswire-Asia/ — Using a novel stem cell based
technology of Cellonis Biotechnologies, Beijing, a Chinese research/medical
team may eliminate a glioma — brain cancer — of a 36 year old Norwegian
patient in a hospital in Beijing. The treatment shows that the activated
immune system can directly kill tumor stem cells as well as cancer daughter
cells. The amazing outcome of this novel treatment within a Comprehensive
Cancer Therapy tells Cellonis that the future vaccination therapies may be
targeted towards cancer stem cell lysates to improve the antigen-presenting
Dendritic Cell response.

(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20091217/CNTH007)

Arve Johnsen, 36, from Norway, a patient diagnosed with glioma in 2006 and
relapsed in 2009 after surgical resection. He arrived in Beijing in August
2009 with his wife Vanja and a one-year-old daughter, with the hope that the
doctors in Norway were wrong. They told the family there is no other option
anymore in the Scandinavian countries or in Europe for Arve to control the
progress of disease and prolong his life. Driven by the hope that their
daughter could grow up with a father, the Johnsen family started a research
campaign to find other treatments worldwide, to give Arve a new hope.

Comprehensive Cancer Therapy in China

The Johnsen’s, having heard about the sustainable success of a
Comprehensive Cancer Therapy (CCT) in China, decided to try for this last
chance in a country 10,000 km away from Norway. This kind of CCT had been
developed in the past few years by a Chinese team of scientific researchers
and clinical doctors in Beijing, combining conventional cancer treatments with
Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and cell therapies.

The role of cancer stem cells in the tumors

Scientists previously believed that tumors are lumps of cancer tissue that
must be completely removed or destroyed to cure a patient. But over the past
few years, researchers have learned that cancer stem cells (CSCs), comprising
a small population of cells, appear to be responsible for the initiation,
upkeep and relapse of malignant tumors. Even if a tumor is almost completely
obliterated, it will regenerate from the surviving CSCs and become even more
resistant to treatment than before.

Current therapies, including cell therapy, generally do not target CSCs.
This allows CSCs to survive until after chemotherapy or radiation treatments.
Killing those cells is a promising strategy to eliminate tumors and prevent
them from re-growing.

Prof. Lily Shum: Perfect integration of stem cells and immunotherapies

“The CSCs may explain why common treatments, particularly chemotherapy,
are not sufficient to kill tumors. In fact, despite the continuous development
of new chemotherapeutic agents, brain tumors can develop and remain resistant
to those therapies. The integration of stem cells and immune technologies
seems to give us a chance to find out a new way to target at CSCs,” says Prof.

“The difficult issue in our project is how to capture and classify CSCs.
With our patented technologies, we are able to isolate the CSCs from patient’s
brain tumor tissues, culture them and induce the multi-drug and radiation
resistance. These cells possess very strong carcinogenicity, self-renewal, and
also a very strong drug and radiation resistance.”

Lily Shum adds, “The Dendritic Cell (DC) is a very useful tool to conduct
a specific immune response against brain CSCs.” As we know, DC is an
antigen-presenting cell that stimulates the innate immune system, as a
messenger, it transfers “the information of cancer cell – antigen” to “the
killers of the immune system – the T cells,” and then T cells can recognize
and lyse cells bearing those antigens. “We educate the DC with the brain CSCs,
and then conduct the specific immune response which targets the CSCs.”

Dr. Dinggang Li: Comprehensive Cancer Therapies

“The outcome of the first pilot study with Johnsen is amazing. The PET-CT
scan for Johnsen shows that all the tumor disappeared after the treatment,”
says Dr. Dinggang Li, M.D. PhD. He has developed and conducted CCT for more
than 100 international cancer patients in the past few years. DCs loaded with
different kinds of brain cancer related antigens that target cancer cells and
the CIK cell treatment are the main elements of his comprehensive treatment
for cancer. “In the first cycle of treatment, we treated him with
comprehensive approaches including SHG-44 loading DC, CIK cell therapy and TCM,
but we had not been able to control the progression of the disease, the tumors
continued to grow. We gave him the DC therapy which targets brain CSCs in the
2nd cycle of treatment, and it showed a very promising response.”

Dr. Cindy HAO: More clinical trials to confirm the outcome

Cindy HAO, M.D., CEO of Cellonis Biotechnologies is optimistic for the
future of this new brain cancer approach. “It gives us a strong confidence to
make more efforts toward this direction. This pilot treatment study shows us
that the activated immune system can directly kill tumor stem cells as well as
tumor daughter cells. But first of all we need to extend our further clinical
trials to confirm the outcome. And it also tells us that the future
vaccination therapies may be targeted toward Cancer Stem Cell Lysates to
improve the antigen-presenting DC response.”

    For more information, please contact:

     Urs. J. Lienert, M.B.A.
     Director International
     Cellonis Biotechnologies Co., Ltd.
     Floor 7, Huizhong Science & Technology Center
     No 1, Shangdi Seventh Road
     Haidian District Beijing, 100085
     P.R. China
     Email: urs.lienert@cellonis.com; Lienert.Cellonis@yahoo.com
     Phone: +86-10-6296-2795; Cell: +86-150-1054-7487
     Cell:  +41-76-584-87-60 (Switzerland)
            (from 20 December 2009 to 15 January 2010)

SOURCE Cellonis Biotechnologies