Cancer Vaccines

Cancer vaccine is an active immunotherapy to stimulate the immune system to mount a response against the tumor specific antigen. Working as a stimulant to the body's own immune system, cancer vaccines help the body recognize and destroy targeted cancers and may help to shrink advanced tumors. Research is currently underway to develop therapeutic cancer vaccines. It is also possible to develop prophylactic vaccines in the future. The whole cell approach to eradicate cancer has used whole cancer cells to make vaccine. In an early stage of this approach, whole cell lysate or a mixture of immunoadjuvant and inactivated cancer cells has been used. Improved vaccines are being developed that utilize cytokines or costimulatory molecules to mount an attack against cancer cells. In case of melanoma, these vaccines are expected to have a therapeutic effect of vaccine. Furthermore, it is attempting to treat stomach cancer, colorectal cancer, pancreatic cancer, and prostate cancer. Other vaccines are being developing that are peptide vaccine, recombinant vaccine and dendritic cell vaccine. Out of them, reintroduction of antigen-specific dendritic cells into patient and DNA vaccine are mostly being conducted. Currently, research and development efforts are underway to develop therapeutic cancer vaccine such as DNA vaccine for the treatment of multiple forms of cancers.

Allicin Reduces Adhesion Molecules and NO Production Induced by gamma irradiation in Human Endothelial Cells

BACKGROUND: Inflammation is a frequent reaction following therapeutic irradiation. Since the upregulation of adhesion molecules on endothelial cell surface is known to be associated with inflammation, the expression of adhesion molecules is an important therapeutic target. METHODS: Treatment of human umbilical endothelial cells (HUVECs) with gamma irradiation (gamma R) induces the expression of adhesion proteins such as intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (ICAM-1), vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 (VCAM-1), and E-selectin. Changes in the expression of these proteins on gamma irradiated HUVECs which had been treated previously with allicin were measured by ELISA. RESULTS: In the present study, we demonstrate that allicin inhibits the gamma R induced expression of ICAM-1, VCAM-1, and E-selectin on HUVEC in a dose-dependent manner. Allicin was also found to inhibit thegamma R induced production of nitric oxide (NO). CONCLUSION: These data suggest that allicin has a therapeutic potential for the treatment of various inflammatory disorders associated with increase numbers of endothelial leukocyte adhesion molecules.