Towards a breast cancer vaccine?

A vaccine component developed in Arizona was able to reduce the development of cancerous tumors. Will it be a vaccine for breast cancer and other types of cancer?

Roy Shani Galileo

A collaboration between researchers from the University of Georgia and the Mayo Clinic Medical Center in Arizona, led to the development of a vaccine component, which significantly reduced the development of cancerous tumors that do not respond to the usual treatments. According to the researchers, the vaccine caused a strong immune response, and resulted in an average reduction of 80% in the size of the tumors.

The findings, which were published in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, point to a promising new therapeutic strategy in the fight against breast, pancreatic, ovarian, colon, multiple myeloma and other types of cancer.
Teach the immune system to destroy the cancer cell

In more than 70% of cancers, the transformation of healthy cells into cancer involves the change of the protein component on the surface of the cell envelope, and the presence of a protein called mucin (which stands for MUC1), which is characteristic of cancer cells only.

The unique structure of the MUC1 protein is characterized by shorter sugar chains than the sugar chains found on healthy cells.

For years, scientists have tried to get the cells of the immune system to recognize and attack the cells carrying MUC1, but until recently their efforts have been unsuccessful because the cancerous transformation that occurs inside the body does not activate the immune system, and this does not recognize the MUC1 protein as an external factor that must be attacked.

Teach the immune system to destroy cancer

As part of the study, the researchers used mice; Similar to humans, cancer cells in mice also express MUC1 on the surface of the cell membrane. According to the researchers, the uniqueness of the current study lies in the fact that this is the first time that a vaccine has been assembled that taught the immune system to locate and destroy cancer cells based on the difference in the length of their sugar chains, which are found in the envelope proteins.

The researchers also claim that the vaccine was developed so that it directs the body's immune system against MUC1 only, which gives it tremendous potential not only in eliminating existing cancer cells, but also as a preventive treatment for people suffering from a high risk of developing cancers that carry this protein.

Also, the vaccine can be integrated into the conventional treatment system such as chemotherapy, or as a treatment for inoperable cancer cases, such as pancreatic cancer, as well as in 90% of breast cancer cases that do not respond to hormonal treatments such as Tamoxifen and Herceptin; These are particularly violent types of breast cancer and are very difficult to treat.

These days the researchers are working on examining the effectiveness of the vaccine on human cancer cells growing in culture. If the results are satisfactory, they hope to move already in 2013 to the first phase of clinical trials in human patients to test the safety of the vaccine and its risks.

For the original article click here

The full article in the February issue of "Galileo" magazine