Tumor invasion and metastasis are the primary drivers of cancer-related mortality. Therapies that have an ability to specifically target invasive and/or metastatic cells are anticipated to have a significant impact in the clinical management of advanced cancers.
Problem: Cryopreservation is a process where living biological materials like cells, tissues, and cell therapies (which are susceptible to damage caused by unregulated chemical kinetics) are preserved by cooling to very low temperatures in the presence of specific cryopreservation media that protects the biological material from damage. In order to be used, the biological material ideally should be thawed in a controlled manner that minimizes damage and desirably brings the material back to a viable state.
Most early work on CD133 was carried out using one of two monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), AC133 and AC141, which recognize an undefined glycosylated epitope of CD 133.
Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease that typically affects the lungs. Current therapies include a panel of antibiotics given over a range of 6-9 months. As a result of the expense of treatment, the extended timeframe needed for effective treatment, and the scarcity of medicines in some developing countries, patient compliance with TB treatment is very low and results in multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB). There remains a need for a faster, more effective treatment for TB.
Researchers at the National Cancer Institute’s Biopharmaceutical Development Program recently developed massively parallel sequencing methods for virus-derived therapeutics such as viral vaccines and oncolytic immunotherapies.
Regulatory B-cells (Breg) play an important role in reducing autoimmunity and reduced levels of these cells are implicated in etiology of several auto-inflammatory diseases. Despite their impact in many diseases, their physiological inducers are unknown. Given that Bregs are a very rare B-cell, identifying factors that promote their development would allow in vivo modulation of Breg levels and ex-vivo production of large amounts of antigen-specific Bregs to use in immunotherapy for auto-inflammatory diseases.
Diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) is the most common type of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and consists of three subtypes: activated B-cell (ABC), germinal center B-cell (GBC), and primary mediastinal B-cell (PMB). Despite advances in the front-line therapy for DLBCL, approximately one-third of patients will relapse. Substantially worse outcomes have been reported for patients diagnosed with ABC DLBCL and treated with standard chemoimmunotherapy, suggesting the need for novel strategies that improve treatment outcomes.
Development of successful HIV vaccine immunogens continues to be a major challenge. Although gp120 was identified as having significant potential as a vaccine immunogen, attempts to elicit broadly neutralizing antibodies using recombinant gp120 failed. The highly flexible gp120 may present numerous conformations to the humoral immune system that are not found on the viral spike.
A number of factors can play a detrimental role in the process of wound healing such as poor nutritional status, smoking, various drugs, cancer, and diabetes. Wound healing impairment is a challenging clinical problem with no efficacious treatments currently available. Nitric oxide (NO) has been shown to play a role in the process of wound healing by promoting both the proliferative and remodeling phases of healing.
The National Cancer Institute, Cancer and Inflammation Program seeks parties interested in collaborative research to further co-develop inhibitors of STAT proteins for the treatment of cancer.