Aldevron Presents: Epo-R Antibodies: A Paradigm for Antibody-Specificity Testing
March 3, 2015 – 11:55 am
Title: Epo-R Antibodies: A Paradigm for Antibody-Specificity Testing
Date: Tuesday, March 10, 2015
Time: 10:00 AM - 10:30 AM CDT
Space is limited! Reserve your Webinar Seat at: www.aldevron.com/webinar
This complimentary 30-minute presentation with Dr. John Thompson, of Aldevron, will be live and followed by a 15 minute Q&A session. Register today to reserve your seat or to receive notification of the available recording.
Click below to read the complete webinar description.
New Protein Booster May Lead to Better DNA Vaccines and Gene Therapy
March 5, 2015 – 4:44 pm
Scientists have discovered a new way to manipulate how cells function, a finding that might help advance an experimental approach to improving public health: DNA vaccines, which could be more efficient, less expensive and easier to store than traditional vaccines.
Their approach, based on research results published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, improves upon an existing laboratory technique, transfection, widely used to study how cells and viruses work.
Jaquelin Dudley, a professor of molecular biosciences at The University of Texas at Austin, and her team have developed a method for boosting the amounts of certain proteins a host cell produces when genes are delivered by transfection. Coaxing cells to produce novel proteins, such as those associated with viruses, is a key feature of DNA vaccines. Dudley's method causes cells to produce novel proteins at levels 5 to 20 times as high as with previous methods.
Jaquelin Dudley, a professor of molecular biosciences at The University of Texas at Austin, and her team have developed a method for boosting the amounts of certain proteins a host cell produces when genes are delivered by transfection. Coaxing cells to produce novel proteins, such as those associated with viruses, is a key feature of DNA vaccines. Dudley's method causes cells to produce novel proteins at levels 5 to 20 times as high as with previous methods.
Study of Potential HIV ‘Cure’ Wins FDA Nod
March 5, 2015 – 1:40 pm
Researchers received the go-ahead from federal regulators to test a gene-editing technique in humans that could jam a doorknob used by the AIDS virus and produce a "functional cure" for the disease.
The trial at the City of Hope medical center will take blood-producing stem cells from patients infected with HIV and use a kind of molecular scissors — enzymes called zinc finger nucleases — to edit a protein that the virus uses to infect cells. The method was developed by Richmond's Sangamo BioSciences Inc.
Study Confirms Long-Term Benefits of Melanoma Immunotherapy
February 25, 2015 – 12:25 pm
A long-term follow up of people on an international clinical trial has confirmed the benefit of immunotherapy for certain patients with advanced (stage 3 or 4) melanoma. More than 18 percent of patients were still alive five years after being treated with ipilimumab (Yervoy) in combination with a chemotherapy drug called dacarbazine.
This compared to fewer than nine per cent who were treated with chemo alone.
Ipilimumab is one of a new class of cancer treatments that target the immune system, and works by homing in on a molecule found on immune cells called CTLA-4. This relieves the molecular 'brakes' on a patient's immune system, allowing it to attack their cancer.
Early Immunotherapy Helps Kids Beat Peanut Allergy
February 24, 2015 – 10:31 am
Very young children who have shown reactivity to peanuts had a high rate of "sustained unresponsiveness" after stopping oral immunotherapy, researchers reported here.
A total of 29 out of 30 patients were able to consume 5 g peanut protein in a food challenge 4 weeks after stopping oral immunotherapy, which had been given for at least 1 year, said Brian P. Vickery, MD, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, in a press conference at the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology annual meeting.
Sustained unresponsiveness is a term that has been introduced to describe an individual's ability to undergo a food challenge without becoming symptomatic and then have the food introduced into the diet ad libitum.
Synthetic Biology Yields New Approach to Gene Therapy
February 18, 2015 – 10:58 am
Bioengineers at The University of Texas at Dallas have created a novel gene-delivery system that shuttles a gene into a cell, but only for a temporary stay, providing a potential new gene-therapy strategy for treating disease.
The approach offers distinct advantages over other types of gene therapies currently under investigation, said Richard Taplin Moore MS'11, a doctoral student in bioengineering at UT Dallas. He is lead author of a study describing the new technique in the Jan. 30 issue of the journal Nucleic Acids Research.
Former Dendreon CEO Launches Stealth Next-gen Immunotherapy Startup in Seattle
February 13, 2015 – 2:06 pm
Dendreon may be on its last legs, but former CEO Mitchell Gold is happily entrenched in other projects: He’s launching a next-generation immunotherapy startup called Alpine Immune Sciences, seeding about $1.3 million into the company through his investment firm, Alpine BioVentures.
It’ll be a recombinant protein-based therapeutic, Gold told MedCity News – and unrelated to the platform used by Dendreon. Beyond that, he’s keeping mum about the venture and will for a while, he said.
New Nanoparticle Gene Therapy Strategy Effectively Treats Deadly Brain Cancer in Rats
February 10, 2015 – 4:29 pm
Nanoparticles have been used to successfully deliver a new therapy to cancer cells in the brains of rats, prolonging their lives, scientists report. Previous research on mice found that nanoparticles carrying genes can be taken up by brain cancer cells, and the genes can then be turned on. However, this is the first time these biodegradable nanoparticles have effectively killed brain cancer cells and extended survival in animals.
U.K. Parliament Approves Controversial Three-Parent Mitochondrial Gene Therapy
February 5, 2015 – 10:08 am
The United Kingdom’s House of Commons voted overwhelmingly today to allow British researchers to pursue a new fertility treatment that could prevent certain kinds of genetic diseases. The technique, called mitochondrial DNA replacement therapy, could allow women who carry disease-causing mutations in their mitochondrial genes to give birth to genetically related children free of mitochondrial disease.
The measure, which passed 382 to 128, has been controversial, especially because it would alter the DNA of an embryo in a way that could be passed on to future generations. Some scientists and nongovernmental organizations have argued that not enough is known about possible side effects of the technique to go forward in human patients. “We believe the House of Commons has made a serious mistake, which we hope does not have dire consequences,” said Marcy Darnovsky, executive director of the Center for Genetics and Society in Berkeley, California, in a statement.
Parkinson’s Gene Linked to Lung Cancer
January 30, 2015 – 11:10 am
Researchers at the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW), in collaboration with other colleagues of the Genetic Epidemiology of Lung Cancer Consortium (GELCC), have identified a gene that is associated with lung cancer.
The findings are published in American Journal of Human Genetics. Through whole exome sequencing, researchers identified a link between a mutation in PARK2, a gene associated with early-onset Parkinson's disease, and familial lung cancer.
