In other words: They made a virus that was sure to make the immune system go apeshit, and they made that virus so that any attack against it would also fuck-up the cancer cells. Immune system is set-off by the virus and takes down the cancer along with it.Annalee Newitz on io9.com wrote:The researchers injected the mice with virus shells (the outer skin of viruses) packed with "libraries" of DNA made up partly of DNA taken from healthy prostate. The researchers believed that delivering the DNA inside viruses would essentially trick the mouse immune system, sending it into overdrive to produce antibodies tailor-made to attack cancers of the prostate. And their theory turned out to be correct. The mice produced antibodies which attacked their cancerous tumors, effectively eliminating the cancer. Because this vaccine's DNA libraries were tailor-made for prostate cancer, however, it also prevented the mice from producing antigens that attacked other organs in their bodies.
In other words: Holy freaking shit!
I can only imagine a lot of molecular-geneticists and other experts of that ilk fiddling their beards and starting to think up what other ailments could be fought with such a technique...other cancers? Maybe persistent infections like hep-c?
I mean, for realz, they cured the cancer in these mice.
They didn't find some statistical significant reduction in occurence or tumor shrinkage or found some link to suggests there might be an anti-cancer mechanism here, they made the cancer go away.
That is 'effin momentous!
Okay, it'll fuck up social security, but still, this is outstanding! Amazing!
I just hope this isn't science by press-release overhyping something, but it sounds straightforward enough - cancer was made to go away.
Here's a more serious source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 133456.htm
And the research paper on nature.com (with paywall, unfortunately): http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/vaop/n ... .2390.html
