Latest news with #NeoVax
Yahoo
07-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Personalized vaccine offers hope for patients with late-stage kidney cancer, clinical trial shows
Cancer researchers are one step closer to developing an effective vaccine to treat people with clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC), the most common type of kidney cancer among adults. In an early-stage clinical trial led by the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, a personalized vaccine prompted an anti-cancer immune response in all nine participants. These patients had been diagnosed with advanced disease and were given the vaccine after their tumors had been surgically removed. All remained cancer-free after a median follow-up period of just under three years. The trial results were published Feb. 5 in the journal Nature. 'Patients with Stage 3 or 4 kidney cancer are at high risk of recurrence,' Dr. Toni Choueiri, director of Dana-Farber's Lank Center for Genitourinary Cancer, said in a news release about the research. 'The tools we have to lower that risk are not perfect and we are relentlessly looking for more.' Tumor removal is the current standard of late-stage ccRCC treatment. In 2021, the Food and Drug Administration approved Keytruda (pembrolizumab), an immunotherapy manufactured by Fortune 500 firm Merck, for post-surgical use in people with kidney cancer. While Keytruda may help lower a person's risk of cancer recurrence, it doesn't work for all patients. Trial researchers, in a sense, manipulated each patient's cancer in an attempt to prevent it from coming back. That is, they fashioned personalized vaccines using the very fabric of the tumors that had been removed. From the tumor tissue, researchers extracted neoantigens, which are bits of mutated proteins unique to cancer cells. Predictive algorithms helped the team gauge which neoantigens might elicit an immune response and should therefore be included in the vaccine. Dana-Farber has dubbed this biotechnology, which trains the immune system to destroy any remaining cancer cells, NeoVax. Previous research has shown NeoVax to be potentially effective in treating melanoma. This form of skin cancer has more mutations than ccRCC, meaning it offers physician-scientists more neoantigens to draw from. That NeoVax appears promising in the treatment of kidney cancer is a win, researchers said. 'This approach is truly distinct from vaccine attempts in kidney cancer,' study coauthor Dr. David Braun, formerly of Dana-Farber and now a medical oncologist at Yale Cancer Center, said in the news release. 'We pick targets that are unique to the cancer and different from any normal part of the body, so the immune system can be effectively 'steered' toward the cancer in a very specific way. 'We learned which specific targets in the cancer are most susceptible to immune attack and demonstrated that this approach can generate long-lasting immune responses, directing the immune system to recognize cancer. We believe this work can form a foundation for the development of neoantigen vaccines in kidney cancer.' Braun and Choueiri administered personalized vaccines to the nine trial patients, five of whom also received Yervoy (ipilimumab), an immunotherapy made by Fortune 500 company Bristol-Myers Squibb. Within three weeks, the vaccine triggered a promising immune response. 'We observed a rapid, substantial, and durable expansion of new T-cell clones related to the vaccine,' Dr. Patrick Ott, director of Dana-Farber's Center for Cancer Vaccines, said in the news release. T cells are a type of white blood cell critical to the immune system. Ott added that while the results are encouraging, 'larger-scale studies will be required to fully understand the clinical efficacy of this approach.' In the meantime, Choueiri is involved in a mid-stage Merck-led trial, in which nearly 300 patients with kidney cancer are being given Keytruda and either a placebo or a personalized immunization similar to NeoVax. For more on cancer: Just one alcoholic drink a day can increase your risk of cancer. But most Americans don't know the dangers, new survey says A 5-minute test can estimate your odds of developing breast cancer—but not if you're biracial Merck-AstraZeneca breast cancer drug reduces risk of death by 28% in patients diagnosed early, clinical trial shows Women get dismissed by doctors—and it's led to devastating consequences for cancer, says the OB/GYN Olivia Munn credits with saving her life Virtual colonoscopy lets you skip the scope. Here's what to know about the colorectal cancer screening Mark Cuban says saves time and money This story was originally featured on
Yahoo
06-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
BioNTech's oncology vaccine trial sees all patients living kidney cancer-free
All nine patients in a Phase I investigator-led trial of a personalised kidney cancer vaccine have successfully generated anti-cancer immune responses following tumour removal surgery. Researchers from the US-based Dana-Farber Cancer Institute administered BioNTech's NeoVax personalised cancer vaccine to all nine patients with stage III or IV clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) following tumour removal surgery. Results published this week in the journal Nature saw all nine patients involved in the trial (NCT02950766) remaining cancer-free at the cut-off point of 34.7 months. The vaccines are personalised by way of neoantigens extracted from the patient's tumour tissue during tumour removal surgery, with predictive algorithms used to determine which neoantigens to include in the vaccine based on the likelihood of inducing an immune response. The vaccine then teaches the patient's body to combat leftover cancer cells and prevent them from resurfacing. Dr Patrick Ott, director of the Center for Cancer Vaccines at the Dana-Farber Institute, said: 'We observed a rapid, substantial and durable expansion of new T-cell clones related to the vaccine. 'These results support the feasibility of creating a highly immunogenic personalised neoantigen vaccine in a lower mutation burden tumour and are encouraging, though larger scale studies will be required to fully understand the clinical efficacy of this approach.' Researchers saw the NeoVax vaccine inducing an immune response within three weeks, with the number of vaccine-induced T cells increasing 166-fold. Additionally, in vitro studies also showed that the vaccine-induced T cells were active against the patient's tumour cells. The Dana-Farber Cancer Institute collaborated with Gateway for Cancer Research, the US Department of Defense, Yale Cancer Center and Harvard Medical School for the Phase I study. Dr David Braun, physician-scientist at Yale Cancer Center and first author of the study, said: 'This approach is truly distinct from vaccine attempts in kidney cancer. 'We pick targets that are unique to the cancer and different from any normal part of the body, so the immune system can be effectively 'steered' towards the cancer in a very specific way. 'We learned which specific targets in the cancer are most susceptible to immune attack and demonstrated that this approach can generate long-lasting immune responses, directing the immune system to recognise cancer. We believe this work can form a foundation for the development of neoantigen vaccines in kidney cancer.' The institute says that it launched a study into the world of personalised vaccines eight years ago after the system demonstrated some success in keeping cancer cells under control as part of a study into melanoma. Elsewhere in the field of vaccines intended to combat cancer, BioNTech has announced the initiation of global clinical trials for BNT116, an mRNA vaccine for the potential treatment of non-small cell lung cancer. Meanwhile, a retrospective analysis of patients with advanced lung cancer revealed that those vaccinated with an mRNA Covid-19 vaccine had better survival outcomes when taking immune checkpoint inhibitors, compared to unvaccinated patients. "BioNTech's oncology vaccine trial sees all patients living kidney cancer-free" was originally created and published by Clinical Trials Arena, a GlobalData owned brand. The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site. Sign in to access your portfolio
