Scientists from Duke-NUS Medical School (Duke-NUS) have developed a new approach using the Zika virus to destroy brain cancer cells and inhibit tumour growth, while sparing healthy cells.
Scientists from Duke-NUS Medical School (Duke-NUS) have developed a new approach using the Zika virus to destroy brain cancer cells and inhibit tumour growth, while sparing healthy cells. Using Zika virus vaccine candidates developed at Duke-NUS, the team discovered how these strains target rapidly proliferating cells over mature cells—making them an ideal option to target fast-growing cancerous cells in the adult brain. Their findings, published in the Journal of Translational Medicine, potentially offer a new treatment alternative for brain cancer patients who currently have a poor prognosis.
Glioblastoma multiforme is the most common malignant brain cancer, with more than 300,000 patients diagnosed annually worldwidei. Survival rates for such patients are poor (around 15 months), mainly due to high incidence of tumour recurrence and limited treatment options. For such patients, oncolytic virotherapy—or the use of engineered viruses to infect and kill cancer cells—may address the current therapeutic challenges.
Zika virus is one such option in early development. The Duke-NUS team used Zika virus live-attenuated vaccine (ZIKV-LAV) strains, which are “weakened” viruses with limited ability to infect healthy cells but can still grow rapidly and spread within a tumour mass.
Read more at Duke-NUS Medical School
Image: From left - Ms Janet Lim, Executor, Estate of Diana Koh; Prof Thomas Coffman, Dean, Duke-NUS; and Prof David Virshup, Director, Cancer and Stem Cell Biology, Duke-NUS. (Credit: Cham Gee Len, Duke-NUS)
