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Laguna Biotherapeutics uses weakened, engineered bacteria as medicines that switch on unusual immune cells able to attack cancer. Its first product, QUAIL-100, is starting a trial in children and young adults with high-risk leukaemia after a stem cell transplant.
Laguna Biotherapeutics, Inc. is a privately funded company headquartered in San Francisco with research labs in Siena, Italy, co-founded by chief executive Jonathan Kotula, chief operating officer Russell Carrington and scientific adviser Dan Portnoy. Its QUAIL platform uses highly attenuated Listeria monocytogenes that cannot grow outside cells, giving drug-like pharmacokinetics, and is designed to activate and expand innate T cells (gamma-delta T cells, MAIT cells and NKT cells) inside the body. A June 2026 PNAS paper described an engineered riboflavin-producing Listeria strain that drives MAIT cell responses and slowed tumour growth in models. The pipeline lists LGNA 100 and 200 for AML and multiple myeloma, and LGNA 200 and 300 for sarcoma and colorectal cancer. Its first registered cancer trial, NCT07573111, a first-in-human single ascending dose study at Palo Alto of QUAIL-100, a live attenuated bacterial therapeutic, in children and young adults with high-risk acute leukaemias or myelodysplastic syndrome after TCR alpha-beta and CD19-depleted stem cell transplantation, was posted on ClinicalTrials.gov in May 2026.
Shares Myelodysplastic syndromes / neoplasms (MDS), Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, Acute myeloid leukaemia.
Shares Myelodysplastic syndromes / neoplasms (MDS), Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, Acute myeloid leukaemia.
Shares Myelodysplastic syndromes / neoplasms (MDS), Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, Acute myeloid leukaemia.
Shares Myelodysplastic syndromes / neoplasms (MDS), Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, Acute myeloid leukaemia.
Shares Myelodysplastic syndromes / neoplasms (MDS), Acute myeloid leukaemia.
Shares Myelodysplastic syndromes / neoplasms (MDS), Acute myeloid leukaemia.
Shares Myelodysplastic syndromes / neoplasms (MDS), Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, Acute myeloid leukaemia.
Shares Myelodysplastic syndromes / neoplasms (MDS), Acute myeloid leukaemia.
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