In an extraordinary development, researchers at the University of California Los Angeles AIDS Institute have discovered a means by which to reprogram the human immunodeficiency virus, known commonly as HIV, to enable it to deliver antibodies against cancer cells. Elizabeth Withers-Ward, who led the team, believes that HIV may be the most effective carrier of antibodies used for cancer gene therapy.
Stating that HIV is the “perfect candidate in that it allows infection of and integration of human cells because it has the right machinery,' Withers-Ward explained that the virus is able to break through the “virus envelope or the outside of the virus, [which is] decorated with a protein.” This action changes that “envelope,” thus binding to the antibodies, which will then “hone in to the type of cell” to which it binds.
The virus actually attaches to P-glycoproteins, the molecules that form on the surface of cancer cells and make them resistant to chemotherapy.
This does not mean that cancer patients being treated in this manner will contract HIV infections, Ms Withers-Ward said. The virus is stripped of the components that ultimately cause AIDS to develop.
'We have taken out about 80 per cent of the HIV sequences and in that way, disabled the virus,' she said. What remains are only the elements that are required to transport the DNA into the cell.
The study was published in the February 13 online edition of Nature Medicine. Researchers caution that, although this is a positive step forward, its use in humans is a long way off. HIV and AIDS is still killing millions of people worldwide – 3.1 million last year alone. But Withers-Ward sees this development as a real positive not just in cancer research, but for the reputation of HIV itself.
'If people would sort of be challenged with thinking about that idea seriously in terms of therapy, a lot of testing would be done and I think then people might feel safer,' she stated. 'It's taking a very negative virus as it were, a virus with a very negative potential and turning parts of it into a very positive thing.'
