Budding HIV cells. Photo: wikimedia commons

HIV used in the battle against cancer

Research carried out by paediatric oncologists at the University of Pennsylvania and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, USA, have shown the world how we may be able to beat leukaemia by engineering our own immune cells.

Seven-year-old Emily Whitehead had stopped responding to conventional cancer treatment while suffering from acute lymphoblastic leukaemia. Two months after the experimental treatment was given, Emily overcame the cancer and test results now show that the cancer has disappeared. She is now in remission.

The CT019 treatment uses a disabled form of the HIV virus to genetically modify the T-cells of the immune system, programming them to attack the cancerous cells. T-cells are a group of white blood cells in the body involved in fighting infections. These T-cells were genetically altered, forcing them to produce an artificial protein called chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) on their cell surface.

The CAR receptor can be imagined like a lock. It covers the cell and can only attach to a key, the antigen, which is complementary to it. For T-cells with CAR on their surface, their key is the CD19 protein, which is only found on another type of white blood cell, the B-cell.

Emily’s cancer is due to her body producing too many B-cells. This means that, unlike chemotherapy, this treatment targets the cancerous B-cells directly, as no other cell in the body has CD19 on its surface, preventing damage to healthy cells.

“We are trying to treat cancer a whole new way,” said Grupp, one of the lead researchers of the project, “and it’s working.”

Traditional cancer therapy attacks the whole body in order to get to the cancer, often leaving the patient with acute side effects, such as anaemia, hair loss and nausea. However, this technique involves taking the T-cells out of the body and modifying them in the lab. Once this is complete, the cells can then be introduced back into the body.

The study also shows that the T-Cells remain in the body for a long time after the cancer has been destroyed. Their numbers may be lower, but they’re ready and waiting, just in case the cancer makes a reappearance while the patient is in remission.

This promising treatment may still be in the early stages of development, but excitement for it’s future has intensified.

“Our hope is that these results will lead to widely available treatments for B-Cell leukaemia and lymphoma and perhaps other cancers in the future.” Grupp concluded.

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.