A team of researchers testing an experimental messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine managed to ramp up the ability of immunotherapy to combat tumors in a study using mouse models. This finding potentially brings scientists one step closer to developing universal vaccines that can supercharge the immune system in its fight against cancer.
The team, based at University of Florida, found that using the test vaccine together with immune checkpoint inhibitors had the effect of strengthening the immune system’s ability to reduce or even eliminate tumors in the mice.
What the researchers found surprising was that the anticancer effect was triggered even if they hadn’t targeted a particular protein within the specific tumor. They just ramped up the capacity of the immune system, and the result was that the body aggressively attacked the cancer cells in a way that mimics how the immune system goes after viruses. The researchers simply triggered a tumor protein, PD-L1, to make it more sensitive to treatment.
Elias Sayour, a pediatric oncologist, who was the senior author for this research, explains that what they achieved paves the way for an alternative to the current ways of treating cancer through chemotherapy, radiotherapy and surgery. Their approach could make it possible to treat different cancers that have so far defied the existing treatment approaches.
Seyour adds that their study clearly shows that a vaccine that hasn’t been developed to target a particular cancer can be effective against different forms of cancer. These universal vaccines could, in future, be commercialized for use by patients diagnosed with various cancer types, as long as the vaccines are mRNA vaccines, similar to those developed against the Covid-19 virus. The difference with this new vaccine is that it isn’t developed to target a specific protein in a given form of cancer; the protein it targets exists in all types of cancer.
The study team tested their formulation against mouse models of brain, bone and skin cancers. In many of the models, the tumors were totally eliminated by the ramped up immune response triggered by the vaccine administered.
The researchers are now working to tweak their formulation in order to proceed to trials involving actual humans in order to expedite its use by patients who need new treatments that can deliver needed clinical outcomes, especially those afflicted by cancers that have remained unresponsive to all the current treatments available.
Many research teams, such as the team at CNS Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: CNSP), are also engaged in extensive research aimed at developing new classes of oncology medications to address the needs of patients who aren’t getting the desired outcomes from existing cancer treatments. These efforts promise to transform how the treatment of cancer is currently being undertaken.
NOTE TO INVESTORS: The latest news and updates relating to CNS Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: CNSP) are available in the company’s newsroom at https://ibn.fm/CNSP
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