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posted by martyb on Thursday November 01 2018, @08:26AM   Printer-friendly
from the promising-development dept.

Secrets of Mighty Cancer Killing Virus Unlocked by Otago Researchers:

University of Otago researchers have used high-resolution electron microscopy images to reveal how an anti-cancer virus interacts with tumor cells, increasing its potential to save lives.

Seneca Valley Virus (SVV), a newly discovered virus which infects cancer cells but not normal tissue, has become a main research project in the New Zealand laboratory of Dr Mihnea Bostina, Academic Director of Otago's OMNI Electron Microscopy unit and senior lecturer in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology.

[...] The virus is a strong contender for effective virotherapy because it selectively targets a receptor found only in tumor cells in more than 60 per cent of human cancers.

The receptor, a protein called ANTXR1, is expressed on tumors, but it has a cousin, ANTXR2, that only appears on healthy tissues. SVV doesn't bind with the similar receptor on healthy cells -- it only shows strong affinity for ANTXR1.

Journal Reference:
Nadishka Jayawardena, Laura Burga, Richard Easingwood, Yoshimasa Takizawa, Matthias Wolf, and Mihnea Bostina. Structural basis for Anthrax Toxin Receptor 1 recognition by Seneca Valley Virus. PNAS, 2018 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1810664115

Very welcome news.


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 01 2018, @11:45AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 01 2018, @11:45AM (#756412)

    It's a picornavirus, so it is a small/naked/positive-sense RNA virus. It normally infects livestock, so typical humans shouldn't have problems with pre-existing immunity (like in the case of measles virus-based oncolytic therapy).

    The virus would work by directly killing tumor cells and, later, recruiting a strong immune response that breaks the immunosuppression resulting from immunoediting.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senecavirus#Clinical_trials [wikipedia.org]
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immunoediting [wikipedia.org]

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  • (Score: 3, Touché) by bob_super on Thursday November 01 2018, @07:49PM

    by bob_super (1357) on Thursday November 01 2018, @07:49PM (#756586)

    Step 1: kill and the cancer cells
    Step 2: mutate
    Step 3: zombies

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 02 2018, @05:07PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 02 2018, @05:07PM (#756927)

    guess the same pre-existing immunity might be a reason REOlysin does not get much press / usage.