$60,000 to develop immune system anti-cancer agent

(8 August 2007)

$60,000 grant to develop immune system anti-cancer agent

New Zealand researchers have received a two-year $60,000 grant to develop and test synthetic compounds aimed at boosting the body’s immune system to fight cancer.

The Cancer Research Charitable Trust today announced the grant to assist the work of three researchers at the Malaghan Institute of Medical Research and Victoria University of Wellington.

Trust executive chairman Troy Manhire, speaking from the Trust’s Australasian head office in Adelaide, said funding for the research had been made possible by New Zealanders’ donations to the Trust.

The Trust is a non-profit organisation which raises funds to support cancer research and prevention, in particular targeting colorectal (bowel) cancer.

The trust was established in New Zealand in 2003 and uses funds raised within New Zealand exclusively for New Zealand projects.

The Malaghan Institute, based at Victoria University’s Kelburn campus, is New Zealand’s leading independent biomedical research facility.

Dr Bridget Stocker and Dr Ian Hermans at the Institute are working with Dr Mattie Timmer from Victoria University to develop anti-cancer agents based on immune system responses.

The three researchers worked closely in the development of the projects, based on accumulating evidence tumour growth can be controlled by the immune system.

“However, in cancer patients these immune responses are typically weak and too late in the disease’s progression to have any effect,” Dr Stocker said.

“Treatment with agents designed to boost immune responses may be an effective cancer therapy.”

The team’s work will focus on a class of molecules called glycolipids which can either prompt the immune system to destroy tumours, or inhibit this response. Whether the lipids help or hinder the fight against cancer depends on their particular molecular structure.

The team has identified glycolipid structures which they believe will prompt the immune system to destroy cancerous cells. The researchers plan to use their expertise in synthetic chemistry and immunology to develop and test glycolipids either as stand-alone therapy or in combination with other treatment regimes.

Dr Stocker completed her PhD in Chemistry in 2004 at Victoria University where she focused on the synthesis of the natural anti- cancer product Peloruside A.

With a post-doctoral fellowship from the Foundation for Research Science and Technology, she travelled to Zurich to work on the development of tuberculosis vaccines at Switzerland’s prestigious Federal Institute of Technology (ETH).

Dr Timmer completed his PhD in Chemistry in 2004 at Leiden University in the Netherlands. He was then awarded a Niels Stensen Foundation post-doctoral fellowship and also travelled to Zurish to take up a post-doctoral position at ETH.

On meeting his partner, Dr Stocker, in Switzerland he travelled to New Zealand last year and obtained a one-year post doctoral fellowship at Victoria University. The pair are currently developing a research programme which interfaces chemistry and immunology.

Dr Hermans leads the Malaghan Institute’s Vaccine Research Group, which is studying interactions which take place between different cells of the immune system during vaccination procedures.

He joined the Institute in 1995 after completing a PhD at Victoria University, and pursued an interest in dendritic cells, a rare population of immune cells with the important job of inducing and controlling immune responses in the body.

His initial studies with fellow Institute scientist Professor Franca Ronchese involved culturing dendritic cells from bone marrow. By exposing the cultured dentritic cells to tumour tissue and injecting the back into the body, it was possible to induce immune responses to cancer tissue. This resulted in a significant reduction of tumour size.

Dr Hermans’ group is testing this approach in a clinical trial in melanoma patients, conducted in collaboration with the Queensland Institute of Medical Research in Brisbane.

Dr Hermans was employed at the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine, Oxford University from 2001-2005 and returned to the Malaghan Institute in 2005 on receiving a Sir Charles Hercus Fellowship from the Health Research Council of New Zealand.

One particular focus of his current studies is on the interaction between dendritic cells and NKT cells, a population of immune cells which reacts to glycolipids. These studies have shown NKT cells can influence dendritic cells, significantly improving their function.

Harnessing this activity of NKT cells with the compounds synthesised by Drs Stocker and Timmer may turn out to be a practical way to improve the potency of anti-vaccines.

ENDS

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