[Mars]

Clone cell cancer 'cure' hailed

Scientists claim they have cured advanced skin cancer for the first time using the patient's own cells cloned outside the body.

The 52-year-old man involved was free of melanoma two years after treatment.

US researchers, reports the New England Journal of Medicine, took cancer-fighting immune cells, made five billion copies, then put them all back.

Scientists in the UK warned that further trials would need to be done to prove how well the treatment worked.

   
This is another interesting demonstration of the huge power of the immune system to fight some types of cancer
Spokesman
Cancer Research UK

The body's immune system plays a significant role in the battle against cancer, and doctors have been looking for ways to boost this tumour-killing response.

The 52-year-old man had advanced melanoma which had spread to the lungs and lymph nodes.

Scientists at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle concentrated on a type of immune system cell called a CD4+ T cell.

   
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From a sample of the man's white blood cells, they were able to select CD4+ T cells which had been specifically primed to attack a chemical found on the surface of melanoma cells.

These were then multiplied in the laboratory, and put back in their billions to see if they could mount an effective attack on the tumours.

Two months later, scans showed the tumours had disappeared, and after two years, the man remained disease-free.

The new cells persisted in the body for months after the treatment.

'Immune power'

While claiming this as a world first, the study authors pointed out that their technique applied only to a patient with a particular type of immune system and tumour type, and could work for only a small percentage of people with advanced skin cancer.

   
Patients will live with their cancer, and die with their cancer, but not of their cancer - it will be like diabetes today
Professor Karol Sikora
Imperial College London

Dr Cassian Yee, who led the project, said: "For this patient we were successful, but we would need to confirm the effectiveness of therapy in a larger study."

Professor Karol Sikora, a cancer expert at Imperial College in London, described the research as "pretty exciting" with potentially wide application.

He said the researchers had focused on melanoma because the disease was well understood compared with other cancers, but other cancers could potentially be targeted.

He said: "I think we will be able to harness the power of the immune system. Eventually we will learn how to control cancer, in other words we will suppress it.

"Patients will live with their cancer, and die with their cancer, but not of their cancer - it will be like diabetes today."

A spokesman for Cancer Research UK also said more research would be needed, adding: "This is another interesting demonstration of the huge power of the immune system to fight some types of cancer.

"Although the technique is complex and difficult to use for all but a few patients, the principle that someone's own immune cells can be expanded and made to work in this way is very encouraging for the work that ourselves and others are carrying out in this field."

Obviously it was only one person, but that's pretty damn cool.

[jdjtcagle]

Very!

[Flipside]

That's a very promising start to the treatment, however!

[colecampbell666]

Sure, it cures Caner, I'd be more concerned it if cured Cancer.

"Yay!" I say. This may end a lot of suffering. At least in Atheists.

[Colonol Dekker]

One step closer to "I am legend" Vampires. . . .this will either end very well or very badly. I always wanted to drive a dodge viper while hunting deer in St James' park ;D

[SPARTAN-367]

You think there is a cure to cancer? Don't viruses adapt to the medicine we give sometimes? Its a never ending cycle. Once we cure Cancer and I mean all different kinds Cancer.. something else bigger will come. Thats what I think. And no we shouldn't give up. Theres probably stuff in us we don't even know about that lie dormant until something activates it.

just my 2 cents. And no I'm not against curing I just find it hard to believe we can live 100% perfect. There is always a problem. Therefore its called life

[tinfoil]

You think there is a cure to cancer? Don't viruses adapt to the medicine we give sometimes? Its a never ending cycle. Once we cure Cancer and I mean all different kinds Cancer.. something else bigger will come. Thats what I think. And no we shouldn't give up. Theres probably stuff in us we don't even know about that lie dormant until something activates it.

just my 2 cents. And no I'm not against curing I just find it hard to believe we can live 100% perfect. There is always a problem. Therefore its called life

QFT - we have to die sometime.

[IceFire]

You think there is a cure to cancer? Don't viruses adapt to the medicine we give sometimes? Its a never ending cycle. Once we cure Cancer and I mean all different kinds Cancer.. something else bigger will come. Thats what I think. And no we shouldn't give up. Theres probably stuff in us we don't even know about that lie dormant until something activates it.

just my 2 cents. And no I'm not against curing I just find it hard to believe we can live 100% perfect. There is always a problem. Therefore its called life

There is no true cure to cancer...eventually it will get us because of its very nature.  Its just a malfunction of cells produced by our own body.  But why should an otherwise healthy and productive person die because a couple of their cells decided to start making mistakes?  We do have to die sometime...that seems to be the way of things.  But I'm all for prolonging life and attaching as much value to it as possible.

[NGTM-1R]

QFT - we have to die sometime.

Says who?

[IceFire]

QFT - we have to die sometime.

Says who?

Entropy?

[Mars]

This is not a medicine in the traditional sense. What they're doing is cloning the cells in the body that naturally attack cancer, and cloning them thousands of times, and injecting billions of these cells back into the body.

Basically it's a clone army of the soldiers we've always had.

[Herra Tohtori]

Hahaha, I can just see the fundo-conservatives' reaction: Cancer cure from Clone souls is evil!

...'cause every clone is sacred, every clone is great,
If a clone is wasted, God gets quite irate.

After all, they do oppose stem cell research... I'll be surprised if they don't go to the fricking barricades against this.

Then again, perhaps they could take a reasonable approach on this matter.


By the way... if there were more radiation, the specimen prone to cancer would die out before getting a chance to reproduce, and the rest of the population would eventually develope more or less similar ways to fix radiation-induced cell damage like Deinococcus radiodurans has. Of course, too much radiation and it'll just kill the species out - along with a few others on the way - but it might be interesting (if a slightly inhumane) experience to separate a population of humans in a town and increase their radiation exposure generation by generation, until they were fit for interstellar traveling without significant radiation shielding...   or nuclear reactor chamber maintenance crews.

I would offer a cookie for every unethical idea or implication in that, but I'd probably run out of them.

....soo.. where was it. Right. Cancer. Carry on...

[NGTM-1R]

QFT - we have to die sometime.

Says who?

Entropy?

Curse you, thermodynamics!

[Herra Tohtori]

Actually, theoretically human life could last as long as the universe has some energy inbalance (entropy hasn't yet reached it's maximum value), as human body isn't a closed system and entropy itself does not answer to the question "why does human life end in natural death after lifetime t", but it does answer to the question "why will life, universe and everything end after time T when universe's entropy reaches it's highest state".


Thermodynamics are funny... they make the game theory kinda depressing, because the rules of the game are as follow:

0. You must play the game.
1. You can't win in the game.
2. You can't break even in the game.
3. You can't quit the game.

There, for all game theorists out there... try and figure out a successful strategy in that.*


*of course, the rules don't hold in a non-closed system like Earth. Which is convenient to leave out or remind depending on the subject of the matter...

[Mongoose]

Thermodynamics are funny... they make the game theory kinda depressing, because the rules of the game are as follow:

0. You must play the game.
1. You can't win in the game.
2. You can't break even in the game.
3. You can't quit the game.

There, for all game theorists out there... try and figure out a successful strategy in that.*

...that is awesome.

And I can't see why anyone (or at least, just about anyone) who has a problem with embryonic stem cell research would find anything objectionable about this, since no embryos are being destroyed.  Hell, most opponents of embryonic stem cell research are heavy proponents of adult stem cell research, which uses essentially the same process that's being employed here.

[colecampbell666]

Crap. I just lost the game.

[FUBAR-BDHR]

Can't believe no one has asked the obvious question yet:

Does the army of cloned cells come with white armor, helmets, and blasters? 

[colecampbell666]

And LAATs.

[Mars]

Don't worry... those furry little cancer cells will tie them in knots 

[Nuke]

is there a disadvantage of having that many immune cells in your system all at once? be cool if you could implant a tiny immune system cloning factory in the human body and never have to worry about getting sick ever again.