Scientists at University College London have developed a melanoma vaccine that they believe has the potential to completely cure cancer. Its peculiarity is that it is a personalized mRNA vaccine, which should trigger the immune system to fight cancer in a particular patient. The second phase of vaccine trials has now been completed, and researchers are moving on to the third and final phase, The Guardian reports.
A recently completed phase 2 trial showed that the chances of developing melanoma in patients treated with the drug were dramatically reduced. Dr. Heather Shaw, research coordinator, believes this vaccine has a good chance of completely defeating melanoma – without the risk of it coming back. The vaccine is now being tested on other forms of cancer: lung, bladder and kidney.
“This is one of the most exciting things we’ve seen in a long time. We have brought [вакцину] to such a level that we can now offer patients something truly effective. <...>Patients are very inspired by them [вакцинами]”
The new vaccine is a personalized neoantigen therapy based on mRNA. It is built in such a way that the immune system recognizes cancer markers – and fights back. To create it, a tumor sample is removed from the patient’s body. Then, using DNA programming and artificial intelligence, a personalized anti-cancer drug is created that is specific to the patient’s tumor.
According to Shaw, the ultimate goal of the research is to completely cure patients of their type of cancer. She believes that the new approach to creating anti-cancer drugs will be a turning point in immunotherapy.
The third phase of the study will be conducted on a larger number of patients. In total, the researchers want to recruit 1,100 cancer patients from around the world. It is planned to find at least 60–70 test subjects in the UK.
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