Articles Tagged ‘vaccine’

Private-Public Partnerships in Cancer Vaccine Research

July 28, 2008

Taxol Molecule

With the cutting edge science developments that occur at NCI, things like combination therapies are coming into play. A significant barrier is that when one company owns a particular drug which works better with an experimental drug from another company (or when trying to test the effects of a combination of two drugs, when both drugs are owned by different companies)–issues may arise when having the two groups come together to make an agreement to be able to use them collectively. Other barriers – even though NCI has platforms to try to mend these issues – include intellectual property rights [which define] who has the rights to what type of discovery. These issues depend upon whether a drug has been given to NCI from an outside [organization] to work with or [if we are testing] something that is being licensed from within. These issues can raise legal concerns and can slow things down, hindering forward development.

Cancer Vaccine Primer

March 21, 2003

How immune cells are activated to attack foreign invaders

Cancer vaccines are intended to treat existing cancers or to prevent the development of cancer.

Therapeutic vaccines are designed to treat cancer by stimulating the immune system to recognize and attack human cancer cells without harming normal cells. Prophylactic vaccines are given to healthy individuals to stimulate the immune system to attack cancer-causing viruses and prevent viral infection.

NCI Pursues Vaccines to Prevent and Treat Cancer

March 21, 2003

How immune cells are activated to attack foreign invaders

Vaccines are commonly used to prevent diseases such as measles, mumps, and polio. In addition to preventing sickness, cancer researchers want to capitalize on the ability of vaccines to stimulate the body’s immune system to mount an assault on existing cancer cells.

In this issue, BenchMarks examines prevention and treatment cancer vaccines. A fact sheet provides the latest information on how cancer vaccines are being made, which are furthest along in testing, and what cancers are being targeted. To get a better picture of how cancer vaccines work, click on the animation, which shows how immune cells are activated to attack foreign invaders. The main BenchMarks article is an interview with Douglas Lowy, M.D., from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) who has developed the technology underlying the prevention vaccine for human papillomavirus (HPV), which causes cervical cancer. Lowy, along with other NCI vaccine researchers, also spoke at a Science Writers Seminar on March 21, 2003 (PowerPoint presentations are available, and a video archive of the seminar can be found at http://videocast.nih.gov). BenchMarks has provided a soundbite from Lowy’s BenchMarks interview, which can be found at the audio clips button. And stills from the animation are also available.