New breast cancer vaccine stops tumors

Cancer therapy: New vaccine to help against 90 percent of all forms of breast cancer

12/13/2011

American researchers have apparently discovered a new drug mixture, which claims to be used against 90 percent of breast cancer tumors. In addition to breast cancer and other cancers can be suppressed, so the hope of the research group.

Vaccine also in intestinal and pancreatic cancer
A new vaccine is said to shrink tumors by as much as 80 percent, according to the auspicious news of scientists at the Mayo Clinical College of Medicine in Scottsdale, Arizona. With the newly discovered drug formula also aggressive breast cancer tumors should be treatable. The vaccine should act according to the scientists against 90 percent of all breast carcinomas and against other cancers. In experiments in the laboratory, the synthetic agent could cause shrinkage of the malignant growths. „The active substance causes an immune reaction of the organism against a certain sugar molecule“. The molecules can be found only on the surface of the carcinomas, the researchers write in the science magazine „Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences“. Through the provoked immune action, the drug could also be effective in patients with aggressive breast cancers, in which cancer therapies with hormones or the active ingredient trastuzumab not help. „This would allow us to open up a treatment opportunity for the large group of patients for whom currently there is only normal, not always effective chemotherapy“, writes the research team in the journal.

Defense system is trained
For the first time, a vaccine had been developed, „that trains the immune system to recognize and kill cancer cells because of their specific sugar molecules“ explained research director Sandra Gendler. The specific sugar molecule called MUC1 is found on 70 percent of all fatal cancer tumors. The molecule MUC1 is detectable in pancreatic cancer, some forms of blood cancer, ovarian cancer and breast cancer. Thus, the cancer vaccine against the molecule has a huge potential for recovery, as the study author says. Thus, the vaccine can be given in advance in the case of risk groups or given in the course of follow-up in order to prevent a recurrence of the cancer. If the cancers such as pancreatic cancer are very aggressive and hardly suggest conventional treatments, the vaccine could be used as an adjunct to chemotherapy if approved.

A cancer vaccine is not new in cancer research. What is new, however, is that most of the previously tried and tested drugs first had to isolate and manipulate the immune cells of cancer patients. This is not the case with the present research. In contrast, the US researchers have artificially produced the developed vaccine in principle. For this reason, the active ingredient does not require human cells for production. „It is therefore easier to produce the vaccine in the laboratory“, say the researchers.

Vaccine a mixture of three combinations
The developed vaccine consists of three compound combinations. The first component is a helping substance that enhances the body's immune system. The second substance stimulates the production of the so-called helper T-cells. The helper cells play a major role in stimulating the activity of the phagocytes and triggering the production of antibodies. The third and most important ingredient component is the actual vaccine, which contains a miniature sugar molecule, the quasi one to the immune system „blueprint“ provides for the structure so that the cancer cells can be found. Thus, with the mixture defenses could be set in motion, in order to realize an adequate cancer defense.

Effectiveness has not been conclusively proven
Actual effectiveness has not been conclusively proven. Although it has been possible in animal experiments to successfully test the effectiveness of mice in the course of two studies, the researchers do not yet know how the vaccine works in humans and which side effects could occur. Scientists expect earliest clinical trials in humans at the end of 2013 at the earliest. Only then will it be possible to investigate how the active substance works in human cancer cells and which side effects can occur.

Development of cancer vaccines not new
All cancer vaccines that are already researched are similar in their structure because the body's immune response is stimulated. Thus, almost all research work goes in the same direction: In principle, the immune system should be activated from the outside to prevent the development or spread of cancer. Another strand here is the viral injection. Researchers at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg are currently working on a method in which tumor cells are to be fought with the help of viruses. In principle, the viruses let them do what they do best: to destroy human cells. However, the viruses are being reprogrammed so much that they are now focused on eliminating cancer cells. But even here, the researchers are still at the beginning. Final test results are expected in a few years. (Sb)

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