Aura Biosciences, Inc. is a clinical-stage oncology company, which engages in developing a novel technology platform based on virus-like drug conjugates (VDCs) to target and destroy cancer cells selectively while activating the immune system to create long lasting anti-tumor immunity. The company is headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts and currently employs 88 full-time employees. The company went IPO on 2021-10-29. The firm is engaged in developing precision immunotherapies to treat solid tumors designed to preserve the function of the afflicted organ with cancer. The company is developing a pipeline of virus-like drug conjugates (VDCs), a class of drugs with a dual mechanism of action, that promote cancer cell death by both the delivery of the cytotoxic payload to generate acute necrosis and activation of a secondary immune mediated response. Its lead candidate, bel-sar, is in late-stage clinical development for the treatment of patients with primary choroidal melanoma, and other ocular oncology indications, as well as in early-stage clinical development in bladder cancer. Bel-sar consists of a human papillomavirus (HPV)-derived virus-like particle (VLP), conjugated to hundreds of infrared laser-activated molecules. The company is evaluating the bel-sar in a Phase III CoMpass trial for the first line treatment of early-stage choroidal melanoma.