What if there was a virus that could find, image, and kill cancer cells all at once? Washington University is trying to create just that for a triple-threat against cancer. Earlier this week, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine received $3 million in a grant from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to develop this virus.
David Curiel, professor of radiation oncology at the Washington University School of Medicine, is leading the effort with his team's expertise on a virus that causes the common cold and has shown promise in cancer therapeutics and imaging. Previous work by Curiel and others has identified certain proteins that could target the virus to specific tissues in the body and even specific tumor types.
NCI has been in pursuit of this new area in cancer research known as theragnostics, which combines therapy and diagnostics into one targeted attack on a specific cancer.
“With a virus, we can alter its genes so that it expresses a protein that could be used against the cancer, or a protein that might enable us to image the tumor,” Curiel explained in a press release.
