Researchers at the University of South Florida have developed a new anti -cancer vaccine for treatment of a wide range of cancers.
Currently, the primary means of treating cancer is the use of chemotherapeutic drugs. These drugs can cause harsh side effects and can limit the quality of life of a cancer patient. As an alternative, an anti -cancer vaccine uses the patient’s own immune system to combat cancer cells, reducing the poten-tial for side effects caused by chemotherapeutic drugs.
In vitro and in vivo data indicate that the vaccine developed by our investigators targets Stat3 activity in tumor cells, which allows the tumor cells to produce pro-inflammatory cytokines that activate immune cells, such as dendritic cells cytotoxic T-cells, and macrophages (see Figure). These acti-vated immune cells are then able to recognize and eliminate tumor cells in the patient.
Stat3 activity is high in a variety of tumor cells, so this tech-nology has great potential as a therapeutic anti -cancer vac-cine for a range of cancer types, including, but not limited to colon, breast, bladder, prostate, and lung cancers.
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