Researchers are testing a new antibody treatment for a hard-to-treat form of leukaemia in the hope of finding a radical new therapy, researchers have reported.
The treatment for acute myeloid leukaemia has been developed in laboratories in Australia and Canada and is now being tested in early trials with patients with advanced disease.
The treatment attacks the leukaemia stem cells that play a key role in the development of the disease.
The new antibody tackles a molecule called CD123 that is found at high levels on the stem cells.
Reporting in the journal Cell Press, researchers led by Dr Richard Lock, of the Children’s Cancer Institute Australia and the University of New South Wales, report on the success of laboratory studies of the treatment.
Dr Lock said patients with acute myeloid leukaemia currently had a poor outlook.
He said: "The cellular and molecular basis for this dismal picture is unclear. However, previous research has suggested that leukemia stem cells may lie at the heart of post-treatment relapse and chemoresistance."
The researchers say the human trials currently show no sign of the treatment causing toxic side-effects.
He added: "The recent characterisation of defined populations of cancer stem cells in a range of human malignancies, as well as their relative resistance to conventional chemotherapy and radiotherapy, supports the broad applicability of our approach and provides rationale for the progression of acute myeloid leukemia/ leukemia stem cell targeted therapeutics from preclinical evaluation to clinical trials."
Cell Stem Cell 5, 31–42, July 2, 2009. DOI 10.1016/j.stem.2009.04.018
Leave a Reply