Killing cancer with cancer

Everyone knows the saying you don't fight fire with fire, but what if you can fight cancer with cancer. A Group of researchers at Brigham and Woman's Hospital believes that one can use the homing ability of cancer cells to find and kill other cancer cells. They believe they can do this by using CRISPR-engineered therapeutic cancer cells. These new cancer cells then find other cancer cells as they do normally however then using what the researchers refer to as a "kill switch", terminated the other cancer. This is most useful when the cancer is in a hard to get to location and other methods would not be as useful to the patient.

This research was done on mice, using the mice's own cancer cells (and reprogramming them), found that the engineered cells moved toward the mice's cancer in the brain then targeted and killed the recurrent and metastatic cancer. They target "cell surface receptors specific to the tumor site" (2)

Corresponding author Khalid Shah MS, PhD, director of the Center for Stem Cell Therapeutics and Imaging (CSTI) in the BWH Department of Neurosurgery and faculty at Harvard Medical School and Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI), "Cell-based therapies hold tremendous promise for delivering therapeutic agents to tumors and may provide treatment options where standard therapy has failed. With our technique, we show it is possible to reverse-engineer a patient's own cancer cells and use them to treat cancer. We think this has many implications and could be applicable across all cancer cell types." This has shown to help the survival rate of these mice and may one day help humans. 

This new research will in my opinion will only help broaden the tools for ending cancer. I also have a feeling this kind of re-engineering can be used not only for cancer cells but maybe for infectious diseases as well.

References:

1- https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/07/180711141404.htm

2- http://stm.sciencemag.org/content/10/449/eaao3240

Cancer Genes Can Turn off Brain Cancer

Scientists working in the Northwestern University School of Medicine have been able to identify a molecule of RNA that can suppress cancer causing genes. This RNA molecule is known as miR-182 and is able to suppress gliobastoma mulitforme in mice. Usually chemotherapy is only capable of damaging the DNA to stop cancer cells from being able to grow. In order to deliver the miR-182 to the tumor cells the scientists had to use nanostructure also know as spherical nucleic acids. From that injection in the blood-brain barrier it was able to increase the cancer cell death and reduced the cell growth. The study showed that the miR-182 suppressed a cancer gene that blocks cell death due to radiation. Using the spherical nucleic acids it was able to reach the tumor cells without using toxicity or affecting the immune system.

This idea could potentially help prevent or stop the growth of brain tumors. Scientists will need to do further research to decide on whether or not to use this method on humans. Since science have only used this on mice that were affected by glioblastoma mulitforme it may not be the same in humans with the same tumor. It could be very helpful to use the RNA molecule to suppress the cancer causing gene but could also be harmful if not properly tested. The advances in cancer research using RNA to try and stop cancer cells from growing could potentially be the next step in treating cancer.

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Additional Information

Gene Therapy and Brain Cancer in Rats

Here are a few quick facts. Glioma is a deadly form of brain cancer which currently does not have any effective types of treatments, and biodegradable nano particles were recently used in animals to kill the cancer cells. The article brings up a good point that there have been numerous improvements in cancer treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation but there are so many different types of cancers and these treatments are not always effective. In regards to Glioma gene mutations gave made gene therapy difficult to complete. That is until researchers at the John Hopkins University were able to directly deliver a new therapy to the Glioma Cells using nano-particles. This method of transportation is called intracranial convection-enhanced delivery. The nano-particles were made from polymers and filled with "DNA encoding an enzyme, herpes simplex virus type 1 thymidine kinase (HSVtk), which turns a compound with little effect into a potent therapy that kills brain cancer cells"(John Hopkins Medicine 1) The resulting compound is known as ganciclovir and it killed the cancer cells 100% of the time.

One of the added bonuses to these findings is that researchers believe these nano-particles could also deliver anti-tumor genes and could be used to fight against other systematic cancer cells. These findings are amazing but they are not being used for humans yet because more test have to be completed before a clinical trial. Jordan Green, Ph.D, associate professor of biomedical engineering, neurosurgery and ophthalmology at Johns Hopkins believes that the nano particles would be introduced into the human body via surgery on the brain although administering it systematically could be more effective.

We live in an age where new threats to humans and animals arise all the time, yet we continue to find innovative and effective ways to treat or cure whatever comes our way. This is an amazing find which could potentially save many lives.

Brain Cancer Gene Silenced in Mice by Experimental Drug

            According to an article on USNews.com, researchers have created an experimental drug that is able to silence a gene related to a deadly brain cancer in mice.  In basic terms, silencing a gene means turning off a gene and its expression.  The experimental drug was created through the use of nanotechnology by 2 scientists from Northwestern University named Chad Mirkin and Alexander Stegh.  It acts upon the gene Bcl2L12, which is responsible for the creation of proteins that prevents the killing of cancer cells.  The type of incurable brain cancer that this new drug works against is called glioblastoma multiforme and it is the cause of 13,000 deaths in America each year.  People who are unfortunate to become diagnosed with this terrible cancer usually have an average survival rate of 14 to 16 months and about 16,000 cases are diagnosed each year.  This drug has caused remarkable results in mice that have glioblastoma multiforme.  Since the drug is so small, it can easily cross the blood-brain barrier and get to the brain tumors.  Then, this drug is able to get inside the brain tumors and turn off the gene so that its expression is terminated.  The drug was administered to mice through intravenous injection and it resulted in the mice having a 20% longer survival rate as well as causing the size of the cancerous tumors to become three to four times smaller.  The next step for the two scientists is to begin testing the experimental drug in clinical trials.

            After doing a little bit of research on glioblastoma multiforme, I came to realize how deadly this brain cancer is and can’t imagine how those who are diagnosed with it must feel.  Even though drugs and new medicine prove to be successful in animals, it does not mean that the treatment will be as successful in humans. However, this new drug provides hope to those who are suffering from this terrible cancer.  Hopefully, the drug is successful in clinical trials because it could help so many people.  By utilizing this drug along with other cancer treatments, it may be possible to cure people of glioblastoma multiforme.  Possibly, the nanotechnology used in creating this drug can be utilized with developing treatments for other cancers like lung, breast, and gastric.  This technology can be also applied to shutting off genes that cause other diseases.  With the knowledge that scientists have about cancers like glioblastoma multiforme, it is amazing how advanced the technology is that is used in creating treatments.  I believe that with the advanced technology that we have today, we are getting ever closer to curing cancer and this article proves we are heading in the right direction.  

 

Scientists 'Silence' Aggressive Brain Cancer Gene in Mice

Test Mice 

Glioblastoma multiforme

 

                A new experimental drug has been found to turn off a gene that is connected to an aggressive and incurable type of brain cancer in mice. Glioblastoma multiforme is a brain cancer that is responsible for 13,000 American deaths a year. The new experimental is uses nanotechnology, which is small enough to advance through the blood-brain barrier to make contract with the brain tumors. This nanotechnology will target the cancer causing gene in the cells and shut them off; this means that the cancer causing genes were silenced.

Gene Silencing

  

               According to the study in, Science Translational Medicine, the mice that were used in these experiments were given the new drug intravenously. The results showed that the mice lived 20 percent longer and their tumors shrank three to four times in size. This had shown amazing progression towards ending this terrible disease. This opens up many doors to different therapy resistances. Many experimental drugs that are used against Glioblastoma fail in clinical trials. The next step is to test this experimental drug in clinical trials, though many results in animal studies are different when used in human studies. Hopefully, silencing these genes and eliminating them from the scenario will allow more treatments to be effective.  

                This disease is the source of thousands of people yearly. I find it amazing that we have come up with such technology that allows us to shut down cancer causing genes. By shutting down these genes, we give ourselves the time to do more research on the cancer itself to see if there are ways to eliminate it completely. This can also open up more research into silencing other genes for other diseases. Nanotechnology can be the beginning of a new era of disease control. 

http://health.usnews.com/health-news/news/articles/2013/10/30/scientists-silence-aggressive-brain-cancer-gene-in-mice

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/probe/doc/ApplSilencing.shtml