Latest news with #VinodBalachandran
Reuters
05-03-2025
- Health
- Reuters
Health Rounds: Roche/BioNTech experimental vaccine shows early promise in pancreatic cancer
March 5 (Reuters) - Half of the patients who received an experimental vaccine for pancreas cancer being developed by Roche (ROG.S), opens new tab and BioNTech ( opens new tab following surgery in a small, early trial were still alive, most without disease recurrence, more than three years later, researchers reported. Typically, the rare long-term survivors of this disease have immune systems that learn to recognize and attack mutant proteins, or neoantigens, in their cancer cells, the study authors noted in a published with their report. The messenger RNA-based therapeutic cancer vaccine, autogene cevumeran, achieved the same effect in eight of the 16 trial participants, the researchers had earlier reported. The researchers, whose findings were published in Nature, opens new tab, do not know why only some patients responded to the vaccine. The vaccine was personalized to deliver instructions that would teach the immune system to recognize each patient's specific tumor cells. Study participants first received surgery, followed by the vaccine and Roche's immunotherapy Tecentriq (atezolizumab), and finally chemotherapy. At a median follow-up of 3.2 years, six of the eight responders remain cancer-free. The two who relapsed had weaker vaccine-induced immune responses compared with other responders, the researchers reported. Seven of the eight vaccine non-responders had cancer recurrences at a median of 13.4 months after surgery. Early-stage trials are designed to test safety, not efficacy, so the researchers cannot say the vaccine caused the delay in cancer recurrence. A larger, mid-stage trial is underway that should be able to shed more insight into the vaccine's efficacy. 'For patients with pancreatic cancer, our latest results continue to support the approach of using personalized mRNA vaccines to target neoantigens in each patient's tumor,' study leader Dr. Vinod Balachandran of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York said in a statement. EPSTEIN-BARR VIRUS BOOSTS CROHN'S DISEASE RISK Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), which causes mononucleosis, can also increase a person's risk of developing Crohn's disease, a debilitating autoimmune condition of the gastrointestinal tract, researchers have discovered. EBV is already known to contribute to higher risks for other autoimmune diseases, including multiple sclerosis, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, but the association with Crohn's had not been recognized. The researchers analyzed blood samples obtained periodically from a large cohort of young military recruits, looking for antibodies against a wide range of viruses. Military personnel whose blood contained anti-EBV antibodies, showing they had once been infected, were three times more likely to eventually develop Crohn's disease compared to recruits without these antibodies, the researchers reported in Gastroenterology, opens new tab. Participants' EBV infections likely preceded their Crohn's diagnosis by five-to-seven years, the researchers said. Later, in a large group of children whose parents or siblings had Crohn's, the researchers could not find evidence that EBV infections increased the children's risk of developing the disease. They speculated that having first-degree relatives with Crohn's could already have put them at increased risk, muddying the association with EBV. The researchers want to learn what the Epstein-Barr virus does at a molecular level to make people more susceptible to Crohn's disease. 'Mechanistically, we need to understand exactly how EBV alters the immune system leading to Crohn's disease,' study leader Dr. Scott Snapper of Boston Children's Hospital said in a statement. 'If you could figure out the mechanisms, you could come up with new therapies.' Keep up with the latest medical breakthroughs and healthcare trends with the Reuters Health Rounds newsletter. Sign up here. Reporting by Nancy Lapid; editing by Bill Berkrot
Yahoo
28-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Early mRNA vaccine trial results show potential breakthrough in fighting one of the deadliest cancers
Pancreatic cancer is one of the deadliest types of cancer, with fewer than 13% of people diagnosed with it surviving for more than five years. It kills 88% of its patients, and its recurrence rate, after surgery, is nearly 90% within seven to nine months. U.S. mortality rates, meanwhile, are on the upswing. But promising results from a small clinical trial for an mRNA pancreatic cancer vaccine are fueling new rays of hope. 'The latest data from the Phase I trial are encouraging,' said lead author Dr. Vinod Balachandran in a news release from Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK), home to the Olayan Center for Cancer Vaccines (OCCV), the research hub behind the study. 'They suggest this investigational therapeutic mRNA vaccine can mobilize anti-tumor T cells that may recognize pancreatic cancers as foreign, potentially years after vaccination.' The trial, which had its results published earlier this month in the journal Nature, tested a therapeutic mRNA cancer vaccine called autogene cevumeran; it's designed to treat, not prevent, cancer by delivering proteins found in cancer (neoantigens) as a way to train the immune system to recognize cancer cells as foreign. A small group of 16 MSK patients, each of whom had had tumors removed, received personalized versions of the vaccine, based on the specifics of their tumor; they also received an immunotherapy drug called atezolizumab and a chemotherapy regimen called mFOLFIRINOX. There were no reports of serious side effects—something that showed in early results and was noted in a 2023 Nature article. Half of patients saw an immune response. Of those eight, just two had their cancer return during the three-year follow-up—compared with seven of the eight who did not respond to the vaccine. Researchers are not yet certain that the vaccine caused the delay in recurrence. One participant died within two years. In these latest findings, researchers could detect substantial vaccine-stimulated T cells (which are developed from stem cells in bone marrow as part of the immune system) up to nearly four years after treatment. Those T cells retained their anti-cancer activity even after patients received post-vaccine chemotherapy—something that researchers thought could diminish the vaccine's effects but did not. The findings hold promise for treating a range of cancers with the same personalized mRNA approach. 'For patients with pancreatic cancer, our latest results continue to support the approach of using personalized mRNA vaccines to target neoantigens in each patient's tumor,' Balachandran, also director of the OCCV, said. 'If you can do this in pancreas cancer, theoretically you may be able to develop therapeutic vaccines for other cancer types.' Genentech and BioNTech, sponsors of the trial, are behind a Phase II clinical trial that began in July to evaluate the vaccine in a larger patient group, enrolling approximately 260 patients at various sites around the world. 'Designing a cancer vaccine tailored to an individual is complex,' said Balachandran. 'Because cancers arise from our own cells, it is much harder for the immune system to distinguish proteins in cancer cells as foreign compared with proteins in pathogens like viruses. But important advances in cancer biology, the development of novel biotechnologies, and genomic sequencing now make it possible to design investigational vaccines that may help the immune system to tell the difference.' More on cancer: Cancer deaths are down, but rates in women under 50 are rising The dangers of drinking: Experts explain the 4 ways alcohol can cause cancer Study confirms link between cancer and at least 10 popular ultra-processed foods This story was originally featured on
Yahoo
19-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
mRNA vaccines show promise in pancreatic cancer in early trial
Personalized mRNA vaccines show promise as pancreatic cancer treatment, a phase 1 clinical trial published Wednesday in Nature found. Fewer than 13% of people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer live for more than five years, making it one of the deadliest types of cancer. That is, in part, because around 90% of cases are diagnosed when the disease is already advanced. Pancreatic cancer cells also spread to other parts of the body much earlier on than in other cancers, which typically spread only when the original tumors are large. The disease typically doesn't cause symptoms until later stages and there isn't a routine screening for this cancer, such as a mammogram or colonoscopy. Once it's detected, there are few effective treatments. 'Although we have made significant progress in improving outcomes in many of the other cancers with newer waves of cancer treatments, these have not had much of an impact in pancreatic cancer,' said Dr. Vinod Balachandran, director of the Olayan Center for Cancer Vaccines at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, who led the trial. 'Survival rate has remained about 10% despite our best current treatments.' That highlights the desperate need for more options, he said, Before mRNA vaccines became widely used for Covid, researchers had already been developing the technology for cancer treatment. This version of the vaccines teaches a person's immune system to recognize and attack tumors, turning the immune system into a cancer-fighting machine. mRNA technology is currently being explored for melanoma and colorectal cancer and other solid tumors. To be effective, mRNA cancer vaccines have to produce a lot of T cells, a type of immune cell that protects the body against invaders. These T cells also need to last a long time in cancer patients and retain their ability to detect and fight off cancer cells. While this is a relatively straightforward feat when it comes to viruses, teaching a person's T cells to fight nonforeign cells that their body itself made is much more difficult. For pancreatic cancer, the task is monumental. For a vaccine to teach the body to recognize tumors, there have to be targets on those tumor cells that are unique, meaning they don't appear elsewhere in the body. Since tumors are created from mutations, these mutations, expressed as proteins on the surface of cancer cells, serve as the targets. Pancreatic cancers typically do not have many targets to choose from. It's been a widespread belief that this lack of mutations, which serve as targets for an mRNA cancer vaccine, would make pancreatic cancer a poor choice for the therapy. But the new study showed that assumption may be wrong. The trial was a longer follow-up to an initial 2023 trial that first tested the efficacy of the vaccines in a subset of people with pancreatic cancer. Phase 1 clinical trials are very early stages of research and are meant to determine whether a certain treatment is safe and shows promise of efficacy. The new trial included 16 patients with receptacle pancreatic cancer, meaning a surgeon can remove the tumors. This is a relatively rare occurrence in pancreatic cancer — only about 20% of pancreatic cancers are operable, which is the only treatment that can stop this type of cancer. Chemotherapy, radiation and immunotherapies can shrink tumors or keep them from growing, but are not considered cures. In an even smaller percentage of people, surgery is possible without first shrinking the tumors with chemotherapy, Wolpin said. The cancer returns about half of the time. Balachandran and his team followed the 16 patients in the trial for up to four years. The participants first had their tumors removed sometime between 2019 and 2021. Then, the team used genetic material from each person's tumors to design personalized mRNA vaccines they hoped would teach the patients' immune systems to attack their cancer cells. In addition to the vaccine, all 16 people were also treated with the current standard of care — surgery, chemotherapy and an immunotherapy drug called atezolizumab. Half of the people in the study — eight of the participants — responded to the vaccine, producing T cells that targeted their tumors. The other half didn't respond to the vaccine. One of the most important aspects of using a person's immune system to fight their cancer is ensuring their response —in this case, the cancer-fighting T cells — have longevity. That way, they stay in the body, fighting off cancer cells that pop up, rather than only working for a short amount of time. In the people in the trial who did mount a response, the vaccine would give their cancer-fighting T cells an average lifespan of nearly eight years, the researchers estimated. They believe that about 20% of the T cells could potentially survive and function for decades. The longer the T cells survive, the better to protect against the cancer's return. Early trials are meant to test whether or not a treatment is feasible — in this case, if an mRNA vaccine for pancreatic cancer could produce durable T cells. The findings suggest that it can. However, it's still unknown whether these T cells will extend a person's life and if so, by how much –– that is a task for the next phases of trials. Just two of the patients who had a response to the vaccine had their cancer return during the three-year follow- up, compared to seven of the eight who did not respond to the vaccine treatments. 'You have to take this with a little perspective, this is not treating hundreds of thousands of people,' said Dr. Brian Wolpin, director of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Center at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. 'The fact that they were able to use a vaccine to generate a response to new mutations that come up in the tumors, and then were able to show that this subsists, is promising.' Because pancreatic cancer cells are adept at spreading early on, some organs may be harboring undetectable cancer cells that don't show up on scans, meaning these tumors aren't treated. With vaccines, the immune system may be able to kill these cancer cells, as well as new ones that pop up, said Dr. Shubham Pant, a professor of gastrointestinal medical oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. Very early on in pancreatic cancer development, 'cells can escape and set up shop somewhere else –– in the liver or in the lungs. They may be quietly sitting in those other organs and then come back,' he said. Despite the caveat of being a small group of patients and a very early trial, Pant said, the results are encouraging. Other research teams, including scientists at MD Anderson, are working on off-the-shelf mRNA vaccines for pancreatic cancer, meaning the vaccines have a target that is common in all pancreatic cancer tumors, rather than a personalized target based on a person's individual tumor. About 90% of pancreatic cancer cases include a mutation called KRAS, meaning nonpersonalized vaccines, which could be produced in bulk and would not require a piece of a person's tumor to create, could potentially be another option down the road. (These vaccines are also currently in very early stages of research). 'This gives us a little more confidence that once you get a T cell response, that it could be durable, it's not a shock response,' Pant said. 'If we can see this response stand up in bigger trials, that's really significant.' This article was originally published on
NBC News
19-02-2025
- Health
- NBC News
mRNA vaccines show promise in pancreatic cancer in early trial
Personalized mRNA vaccines show promise as pancreatic cancer treatment, a phase 1 clinical trial published Wednesday in Nature found. Fewer than 13% of people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer live for more than five years, making it one of the deadliest types of cancer. That is, in part, because around 90% of cases are diagnosed when the disease is already advanced. Pancreatic cancer cells also spread to other parts of the body much earlier on than in other cancers, which typically spread only when the original tumors are large. The disease typically doesn't cause symptoms until later stages and there isn't a routine screening for this cancer, such as a mammogram or colonoscopy. Once it's detected, there are few effective treatments. 'Although we have made significant progress in improving outcomes in many of the other cancers with newer waves of cancer treatments, these have not had much of an impact in pancreatic cancer,' said Dr. Vinod Balachandran, director of the Olayan Center for Cancer Vaccines at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, who led the trial. 'Survival rate has remained about 10% despite our best current treatments.' That highlights the desperate need for more options, he said, Before mRNA vaccines became widely used for Covid, researchers had already been developing the technology for cancer treatment. This version of the vaccines teaches a person's immune system to recognize and attack tumors, turning the immune system into a cancer-fighting machine. mRNA technology is currently being explored for melanoma and colorectal cancer and other solid tumors. To be effective, mRNA cancer vaccines have to produce a lot of T cells, a type of immune cell that protects the body against invaders. These T cells also need to last a long time in cancer patients and retain their ability to detect and fight off cancer cells. While this is a relatively straightforward feat when it comes to viruses, teaching a person's T cells to fight nonforeign cells that their body itself made is much more difficult. For pancreatic cancer, the task is monumental. For a vaccine to teach the body to recognize tumors, there have to be targets on those tumor cells that are unique, meaning they don't appear elsewhere in the body. Since tumors are created from mutations, these mutations, expressed as proteins on the surface of cancer cells, serve as the targets. Pancreatic cancers typically do not have many targets to choose from. It's been a widespread belief that this lack of mutations, which serve as targets for an mRNA cancer vaccine, would make pancreatic cancer a poor choice for the therapy. But the new study showed that assumption may be wrong. The trial was a longer follow-up to an initial 2023 trial that first tested the efficacy of the vaccines in a subset of people with pancreatic cancer. Phase 1 clinical trials are very early stages of research and are meant to determine whether a certain treatment is safe and shows promise of efficacy. The new trial included 16 patients with receptacle pancreatic cancer, meaning a surgeon can remove the tumors. This is a relatively rare occurrence in pancreatic cancer — only about 20% of pancreatic cancers are operable, which is the only treatment that can stop this type of cancer. Chemotherapy, radiation and immunotherapies can shrink tumors or keep them from growing, but are not considered cures. In an even smaller percentage of people, surgery is possible without first shrinking the tumors with chemotherapy, Wolpin said. The cancer returns about half of the time. Balachandran and his team followed the 16 patients in the trial for up to four years. The participants first had their tumors removed sometime between 2019 and 2021. Then, the team used genetic material from each person's tumors to design personalized mRNA vaccines they hoped would teach the patients' immune systems to attack their cancer cells. In addition to the vaccine, all 16 people were also treated with the current standard of care — surgery, chemotherapy and an immunotherapy drug called atezolizumab. Half of the people in the study — eight of the participants — responded to the vaccine, producing T cells that targeted their tumors. The other half didn't respond to the vaccine. One of the most important aspects of using a person's immune system to fight their cancer is ensuring their response —in this case, the cancer-fighting T cells — have longevity. That way, they stay in the body, fighting off cancer cells that pop up, rather than only working for a short amount of time. In the people in the trial who did mount a response, the vaccine would give their cancer-fighting T cells an average lifespan of nearly eight years, the researchers estimated. They believe that about 20% of the T cells could potentially survive and function for decades. The longer the T cells survive, the better to protect against the cancer's return. Early trials are meant to test whether or not a treatment is feasible — in this case, if an mRNA vaccine for pancreatic cancer could produce durable T cells. The findings suggest that it can. However, it's still unknown whether these T cells will extend a person's life and if so, by how much –– that is a task for the next phases of trials. Just two of the patients who had a response to the vaccine had their cancer return during the three-year follow- up, compared to seven of the eight who did not respond to the vaccine treatments. 'You have to take this with a little perspective, this is not treating hundreds of thousands of people,' said Dr. Brian Wolpin, director of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Center at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. 'The fact that they were able to use a vaccine to generate a response to new mutations that come up in the tumors, and then were able to show that this subsists, is promising.' Because pancreatic cancer cells are adept at spreading early on, some organs may be harboring undetectable cancer cells that don't show up on scans, meaning these tumors aren't treated. With vaccines, the immune system may be able to kill these cancer cells, as well as new ones that pop up, said Dr. Shubham Pant, a professor of gastrointestinal medical oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. Very early on in pancreatic cancer development, 'cells can escape and set up shop somewhere else –– in the liver or in the lungs. They may be quietly sitting in those other organs and then come back,' he said. Despite the caveat of being a small group of patients and a very early trial, Pant said, the results are encouraging. Other research teams, including scientists at MD Anderson, are working on off-the-shelf mRNA vaccines for pancreatic cancer, meaning the vaccines have a target that is common in all pancreatic cancer tumors, rather than a personalized target based on a person's individual tumor. About 90% of pancreatic cancer cases include a mutation called KRAS, meaning nonpersonalized vaccines, which could be produced in bulk and would not require a piece of a person's tumor to create, could potentially be another option down the road. (These vaccines are also currently in very early stages of research). 'This gives us a little more confidence that once you get a T cell response, that it could be durable, it's not a shock response,' Pant said. 'If we can see this response stand up in bigger trials, that's really significant.'
