New research presented at the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR) virtual annual meeting this week from the Yale Cancer Center highlights an antibody that could be used to treat melanoma. The antibody is able to target tumors and enter cells in order to stimulate an immune response.
"Most approaches rely on direct injection into tumors of ribonucleic acids (RNAs) or other molecules to boost the immune response, but this is not practical in the clinic, especially for patients with advanced cancer," said senior author of the study Peter M. Glazer, MD, PhD. Glazer is Chair of the Department of Therapeutic Radiology at Yale as well as Chief of Radiation Oncology at Smilow Cancer Hospital. "In this study, we can deliver immunostimulatory RNA to tumors in vivo following systemic administration."
Lead author of the study, Elias Quijano, and along with co-author, Yanfeng Liu, explain that they conducted their study on mice with melanoma tumors and demonstrated almost complete tumor suppression upon intravenous injection of antibody/RNA complexes.
"These results are very encouraging," added Glazer. "They highlight a novel approach for the systemic delivery of immunostimulatory RNAs in a targeted manner that may one day offer therapeutic advantages for difficult to treat cancers like melanoma, over current approaches."
Sources: Yale University, Science Daily
