New injection could wipe out cancer

A new antibody injection could 'wipe out advanced cancer' by rooting out and obliterating tumours, scientists have revealed.

The research has been hailed a 'tour de force', raising hopes the body's immune system could be trained to attack melanoma, pancreatic, breast and lung cancer.

The team at Stanford University School of Medicine believe the laboratory-engineered antibodies could eradicate not only primary tumours, but also distant metastases that have spread through the body.

Professor Edgar Engleman, senior author of the study, said: 'The potency is impressive.

'You actually see tumour eradication.' 

His team concluded their approach differed to other potential treatments that only apply to specific cancers, in that it could target a wide range of solid tumours. 

The process relies on the same mechanism as that which causes animals' bodies to reject organ transplants, researchers said.

In both cases, antibodies - molecules that detect foreign substances in the body - trigger the immune system.

They bind themselves to proteins from the foreign tissue - in this case the tumour - and through the use of signalling cells, alert T-cells, that act like the immune's system's SWAT team.

When the T-cells come into contact with the 'unwelcome' tissue, they attack and destroy it.

Researchers isolated the antibodies from mice that were found to be resistant to the cancers.

They then injected these antibodies, along with chemicals that activated signalling cells, known as dendritic cells, into cancerous mice.

The mice mounted an immune response and were found to remain cancer-free for more than a year.

Once primed to recognise the cancerous tissue, the T-cells would multiply and not only attack the tumour, but hunt down any metastatic cells travelling through the body. 

Medical oncologist assistant professor Holbrook Kohrt at Stanford, who was not involved with the study, called the paper 'a nice tour de force' and believes the novel therapeutic strategy could utilise the patient's own immune system to defend against certain cancers.

He oversees numerous clinical trials involving immunotherapy for cancer patients and thinks an important aspect of the technique is its potential to fight different tumour types.

He added that given the chemicals used have already been used in other clinical trials, developing them into a therapeutic drug should be 'fairly straightforward'.  

'I honestly think the most important thing is to see if we can bring this new approach into the clinic,' said Professor Engleman. 'That's where we want to go.'

The study was published in the journal Nature.

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