Scientists have discovered a way to transform cancer cells into powerful anticancer agents.
Researchers have developed an innovative cell therapy to eradicate tumors and instill long-term immunity. This will train the immune system and prevent it from returning.
The team’s early research showed promising results when they tested their dual-action cancer-killing vaccination in a mouse model that was advanced and modeled the deadly brain tumor glioblastoma. The findings are published in Science Translational Medicine.
Our team pursued a simple concept: take cancer cells and turn them into cancer killers and vaccinations,” said Shah, who also serves as director of the Center for Stem Cell and Translational Immunotherapy and as vice chair of research at Brigham and Women’s Department of Neurosurgery as well as faculty at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute.
Shah explained that by using gene engineering to repurpose cancer cells, they are developing a therapeutic which kills tumor cells while stimulating the immune system in order to both destroy primary tumors as well as prevent cancer.
Shah and his team have developed a unique approach to cancer vaccines. The team uses living tumor cells instead of inactivated ones, as they have an unusual property.
Living tumor cells travel across the brain like homing pigeons to their nest. Shah’s team took advantage of this unique property and engineered living cancer cells using the gene editing tool CRISPR Cas9. They then repurposed these cells to release a cell-killing agent.
The engineered tumor cells also express factors to make it easier for the immune systems to recognize, remember, and tag them. This primes the immune system in a long-term response against cancer.
The team tested its repurposed CRISPR enhanced and reverse engineered therapeutic tumor cells on different mouse strains, including a strain that contained bone marrow cells, liver cells, and thymus derived from human, mimicking the immune microenvironment of humans.
Shah’s team has also developed a safety switch that, when activated by the cancer cells, will eliminate therapeutic tumors if necessary. The dual-action cell treatment was effective, safe and applicable in these models. It suggests a path to therapy.
Shah’s team chose to use human cells as a model for their research, despite the need for further testing and development.
Shah said that “even when the work is highly technical, the patient always remains in our minds.”
He said: “Our goal is an innovative, but translateable approach to develop a therapeutic cancer-killing vaccination that will ultimately have a lasting effect in medicine.”
Shah and his colleagues point out that this treatment strategy can be applied to a broader range of solid tumours, and that more research is needed into its application.
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