细胞技术

Oligonucleotides with guanosine-rich (G-rich) sequences often have unusual physical and biological properties, including resistance to nucleases, enhanced cellular uptake, and high affinity for particular proteins. Furthermore, we have found that certain G-rich oligon ...

Aptamers are in vitro evolved molecules that bind to target proteins with high affinity and specificity by adapting three-dimensional structures upon binding. Because cancer cells exhibit the activation of signaling pathways that are not usually activated in normal cells, RNA apta ...

Phosphorodiamidate morpholino oligomers (PMO), which have a neutral chemistry, are extensively being used as tools for selective inhibition of gene expression in cell culture models and are currently in human clinical trials. PMO oligomers possess a unique structure, in which the deo ...

Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) can arise de novo or progress from a lower to higher grade and can possess a series of genetic alterations and dynamic progressions, which have been correlated with the molecular pathology of GBM. Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) has been shown to be overex ...

Members of the tumor necrosis factor (TNF) superfamily influence a variety of immunological functions, including cellular activation, proliferation, and death, upon interaction with a corresponding superfamily of receptors. Whereas interest in the apoptosis-inducing mo ...

Combination chemotherapy has been shown to be more effective than single-agent therapy for many types of cancer, but both are known to induce drug resistance in cancer cells. Two major culprits in the development of this drug resistance are nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) and the multidrug resistan ...

This chapter illustrates our protocol for in vivo biopanning using T7 bacteriophage libraries for the purpose of selecting recombinant peptides for the tumor-specific delivery of radiosensitizers to radiation-inducible antigens within tumor neovasculature. Our goal is to d ...

New genes useful in suicide gene therapy are those encoding toxins such as plant ribosome-inactivating proteins (RIPs), which can irreversibly block protein synthesis, triggering apoptotic cell death. Plasmids expressing a cytosolic saporin (SAP) gene from common soapwort (Sap ...

Innovative approaches to induce a strong immune response are key to the success of immunotherapy. Dendritic cells (DCs) are professional antigen-presenting cells (APCs) equipped with co-stimulatory, adhesion, and major histocompatibility complex (MHC) molecules needed for i ...

An antitumor DNA vaccine is a bacterial DNA plasmid that encodes the complementary DNA (cDNA) of a tumor antigen. When injected into recipients, antitumor DNA vaccines have been shown to elicit both humoral and cellular immunity against the encoded tumor antigen. These vaccines represent a r ...

Gene-based immunization with transgenic DNA vectors expressing tumor-associated antigens (TAA), cytokines, or chemokines, alone or in combination, provides an attractive approach to increase the cytotoxic T cell immunity against various cancer diseases. With this consider ...

Membrane electroporation (MEP) uses short high-voltage pulses to render cell membranes transiently porous and therewith permeable to otherwise impermeable substances. This technique was first described, in vitro, by Neumann in 1982 ( 1 ). In vivo, this method is restricted to solid tiss ...

The main challenges for application of gene therapy to patients are poor selectivity in vector targeting, insufficient gene transfer, and great difficulties in systemic treatment in association with safety concerns for particular vector systems. For success in gene therapy, safe, a ...

Ultrasound-mediated gene transfection (sonotransfection) has been shown to be a promising physical method for gene therapy, especially for cancer gene therapy. The procedure being done in vitro uses several ultrasound exposure (sonication) setups. Although high transfection ...

Gene therapy holds great promise for the treatment of cancer. The success of the strategy relies on effective gene transfer into tumor microenvironments. Although a variety of gene delivery vehicles, such as viral vectors, has been developed, most of them suffer from some limitations, inclu ...

Nonviral gene therapy vectors are commonly based on recombinant bacterial plasmids or their derivatives. The plasmids are propagated in bacteria, so, in addition to their therapeutic cargo, they necessarily contain a bacterial replication origin and a selection marker, usually a ge ...

A primary limitation to using nonviral vectors for cancer gene therapy is transient expression of the therapeutic gene. Even when the ultimate goal is tumor cell death, a minimum threshold of gene expression is required to kill tumor cells by direct or indirect mechanisms. It has been shown that tr ...

A large number of cancer gene therapy clinical trials are currently being performed that are attempting to evaluate novel approaches to eliminate tumor cells by the introduction of genetic material into patients. One of the most important objectives in gene therapy is the development of hi ...

Tumor-selective replication-competent viral vectors, such as oncolytic herpes simplex virus (HSV) type I (HSV-1), represent an attractive strategy for tumor-based therapies because these viruses can replicate and spread in situ exhibiting cytopathic effects through direct o ...

Adenovirus provides an attractive candidate tool to destroy tumor cells. However, to fulfill the expectations, selective targeting of tumor cells is mandatory. This chapter reviews critical aspects in the design of tumor-targeted adenovirus vectors and oncolytic adenoviruses. ...