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Scientists have taken a “very positive step” towards creating a universal vaccine against cancer that makes the body’s immune system attack tumours as if they were a virus, experts have said.
Writing in Nature, an international team of researchers described how they had taken pieces of cancer’s genetic RNA code, put them into tiny nanoparticles of fat and then injected the mixture into the bloodstreams of three patients in the advanced stages of the disease.
The patients' immune systems responded by producing "killer" T-cells designed to attack cancer.
Omar Kahn, a chemical engineer at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, hopes his customizable vaccine will soon follow. The vaccine uses messenger RNA, a genetic material that researchers program to fight any disease-causing organism by stimulating an amplified immune response in the body. The messenger RNA is bound to a nanoparticle that delivers it into cells. "So things like, for example, Zika or the recent Ebola outbreak, we can rapidly respond to that within seven days,” Khan said. “So when there is an extraordinary need and you need something that is safe, then we have the ability to make that happen."
Customizable Vaccine Could Fight Numerous Diseases
It's an idea that has been around for a long time. However, getting the vaccine into cells has been a challenge, so MIT researchers designed it to be as small as the virus it's targeting. The scientists developed and tested vaccines against Ebola and H1N1 flu that proved 100 percent effective in lab mice in a study published in July in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Since that study, according to Kahn, the researchers have tested an RNA vaccine for Zika in mice and have had similarly successful results. "So, we are definitely interested to see if these vaccines could be used to treat people with cancer, or even for patients that may be at risk for specific cancers,” said Daniel Anderson of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Customizable Vaccine Could Fight Numerous Diseases
A 22-year-old British student has invented a mobile fridge that could save millions of lives across the world. Will Broadway's "Isobar" has been designed to keep vaccines at the ideal temperature while in transit in developing countries. And Will doesn't plan to make money from his creation. His focus is to get it to people who need it, which is why he won't be trying to get a patent. "I make things every day for people who have everything," Will, an industrial design and technology graduate from Loughborough University, tells Newsbeat. "I wanted to make something for people who have next to nothing. It should be a basic human right, in my opinion, to have a vaccination. "I don't think that it should be patented to restrict use."
Will's Isobar has won him the annual James Dyson Award, open to students across the world with a simple brief - design something that solves a problem. Current methods of transporting vaccines can result in the vaccines freezing before reaching their destination in countries where poverty and conflict are major obstacles. The device maintains a steady two-eight degrees for 30 days. It works by heating ammonia and water to create ammonia vapours, which are then released into its main chamber when cooling is needed. Will was inspired to start work on a portable refrigeration unit in 2012 when he visited Cambodia and parts of south east Asia. "These trips sparked an interest," he says. "It pushed me. Something needs to be solved for this major issue."
Here's how the chemical reaction works inside the Isobar
Having previously worked at a medical device consultancy, Will has first-hand experience of how large companies monetise life-saving products. "Medical products have such a big mark up that it's unreasonable for people around the world to purchase these items," he says. "If it is the best thing available, then it should be out there saving lives." It has been estimated that Will's invention could save the lives of 1.5 million people across the world, a number he says is "astonishing". Having now finished his degree, his focus is taking the Isobar into production - something he plans to oversee. "I would be hands on, all the way through it, knowing that it works," he says. "It's amazing to just give it a go, even in my back yard, and see the potential of the technology."
The Isobar unit is easily transported
The product has been designed to transport vaccines, but already Broadway sees potential for other medical uses in the developing world and beyond. "Blood donations, organ transplants - if they get stuck in traffic, you still use cold-packs that really aren't adequate for long periods of time," he says. There is also a potential, non-medical use for Isobar which could be monetised in the Western world. "It's risky but but there is potential for commercial cooling. It would be a great thing to take on a five day trip where you have no power," he says. But he insists vaccine delivery is the primary function of his invention. "It has been applied to what is hopefully the right avenue for the technology."
This invention by a British student could save millions of lives across the world
