A cancer vaccine is a vaccine that either treats existing cancer or prevents development of cancer. Vaccines that treat existing cancer are known as therapeutic cancer vaccines or tumor antigen vaccines. Some of the vaccines are "autologous", being prepared from samples taken from the patient, and are specific to that patient.
Cancer immunotherapy is the stimulation of the immune system to treat cancer, improving on the immune system's natural ability to fight the disease. It is an application of the fundamental research of cancer immunology and a growing subspecialty of oncology.
Virotherapy is a treatment using biotechnology to convert viruses into therapeutic agents by reprogramming viruses to treat diseases. There are three main branches of virotherapy: anti-cancer oncolytic viruses, viral vectors for gene therapy and viral immunotherapy. These branches use three different types of treatment methods: gene overexpression, gene knockout, and suicide gene delivery. Gene overexpression adds genetic sequences that compensate for low to zero levels of needed gene expression. Gene knockout uses RNA methods to silence or reduce expression of disease-causing genes. Suicide gene delivery introduces genetic sequences that induce an apoptotic response in cells, usually to kill cancerous growths. In a slightly different context, virotherapy can also refer more broadly to the use of viruses to treat certain medical conditions by killing pathogens.
Coley's toxins is a mixture containing toxins filtered from killed bacteria of species Streptococcus pyogenes and Serratia marcescens, named after William Coley, a surgical oncologist at the Hospital for Special Surgery who developed the mixture in the late 19th century as a treatment for cancer.
The "war on cancer" is the effort to find a cure for cancer by increased research to improve the understanding of cancer biology and the development of more effective cancer treatments, such as targeted drug therapies. The aim of such efforts is to eradicate cancer as a major cause of death. The signing of the National Cancer Act of 1971 by United States president Richard Nixon is generally viewed as the beginning of this effort, though it was not described as a "war" in the legislation itself.
Patrick Soon-Shiong is a Chinese-South African transplant surgeon, billionaire businessman, bioscientist, and media proprietor. He is the inventor of the drug Abraxane, which became known for its efficacy against lung, breast, and pancreatic cancer. Soon-Shiong is the founder of NantWorks, a network of healthcare, biotech, and artificial intelligence startups; an adjunct professor of surgery and executive director of the Wireless Health Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles; and a visiting professor at Imperial College London and Dartmouth College. Soon-Shiong has published more than 100 scientific papers and has more than 230 issued patents worldwide on advancements spanning numerous fields in technology and medicine.
The Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC), previously known as the International Society for Biological Therapy of Cancer (iSBTc), is a professional society of scientists, academicians, researchers, clinicians, government representatives, and industry leaders from around the world dedicated to improving outcomes in patients with cancer by advancing the science and application of cancer immunotherapy. Currently, SITC has more than 2,400 members, representing 22 medical specialties from 42 countries around the world, who are engaged in the research and treatment of cancer.
CancerVax was an American pharmaceutical company founded in 1998 by Donald Morton. The company sought to develop a vaccine for cancer, and had candidates for melanoma reach phase III clinical trials. When those trials proved unsuccessful in 2005, the company soon underwent a reverse takeover with Micromet.
Benaroya Research Institute (BRI) is a Seattle, Washington non-profit organization that conducts medical research on many diseases and immune disorders, including autoimmune disease. It is affiliated with Virginia Mason Health System, and is located on the campus of Virginia Mason Medical Center.
GlobeImmune, Inc. is a clinical-stage public biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Louisville, Colorado, that develops therapeutic vaccines to treat cancer and infectious diseases. As of August 2014, the company had no marketed products. GlobeImmune’s therapeutic vaccines are developed on the company’s Tarmogen immunotherapy platform. Tarmogens are made from genetically modified yeast that express one or more disease-associated antigens. Tarmogens activate T cells to specifically target and eliminate diseased cells with the same target antigen.
Nivolumab, sold under the brand name Opdivo, is a medication used to treat a number of types of cancer. This includes melanoma, lung cancer, malignant pleural mesothelioma, renal cell carcinoma, Hodgkin lymphoma, head and neck cancer, urothelial carcinoma, colon cancer, esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, liver cancer, gastric cancer, and esophageal or gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) cancer. It is used by slow injection into a vein.
HIV/AIDS research includes all medical research that attempts to prevent, treat, or cure HIV/AIDS, as well as fundamental research about the nature of HIV as an infectious agent and AIDS as the disease caused by HIV.
Pembrolizumab, sold under the brand name Keytruda, is a humanized antibody used in cancer immunotherapy that treats melanoma, lung cancer, head and neck cancer, Hodgkin lymphoma, stomach cancer, cervical cancer, and certain types of breast cancer. It is given by slow injection into a vein.
Kite Pharma is an American biotechnology company that develops cancer immunotherapy products, with a primary focus on genetically-engineered autologous T cell therapy with chimeric antigen receptors (CAR-T). Based in Santa Monica, California, it was acquired by Gilead Sciences.
Juno Therapeutics Inc is an American biopharmaceutical company founded in 2013 through a collaboration of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and pediatrics partner Seattle Children's Research Institute. The company was launched with an initial investment of $120 million, with a remit to develop a pipeline of cancer immunotherapy drugs. The company raised $300 million through private funding and a further $265 million through their IPO.
Julianna Lisziewicz is a Hungarian immunologist. Lisziewicz headed many research teams that have discovered and produced immunotheraputic drugs to treat diseases like cancer and chronic infections like HIV/AIDS. Some of these drugs have been successfully used in clinical trials.
The Immune Response Corporation (IRC) pioneered immunotherapeutic products. The firm was founded by Jonas Salk and Kevin Kimberlin when Kimberlin, "asked Salk to become lead scientific advisor for a new biotech company specializing in 'anti-idiotypes,' a novel vaccine technology," Salk called the proposal "liberating."
NantWorks LLC founded in 2007 is an American multinational conglomerate holding company. It owns a number of technology companies in the fields of healthcare, commerce, digital entertainment as well as a venture capital firm in the healthcare, education, science, and technology sectors. Particular technologies include machine vision, object and voice recognition, low power semiconductors, supercomputing, and networking technologies.
A therapeutic vaccine is a vaccine which is administered after a disease or infection has already occurred. A therapeutic vaccine works by activating the immune system of a patient to fight an infection. A therapeutic vaccine differs from a prophylactic vaccine in that prophylactic vaccines are administered to individuals as a precautionary measure to avoid the infection or disease while therapeutic vaccines are administered after the individual is already affected by the disease or infection. A therapeutic vaccine fights an existing infection in the body rather than immunizing the body for protection against future diseases and infections. Therapeutic vaccines are mostly used against viral infections. Patients affected with chronic viral infections are administered with therapeutic vaccines, as their immune system is not able to produce enough efficient antibodies.
BeiGene is a biotechnology company that specializes in the development of drugs for cancer treatment. Founded in Beijing in 2010 by Xiaodong Wang and chief executive officer John V. Oyler, the company has offices in China, the United States, Australia and Europe. BeiGene has developed several pharmaceuticals, including tislelizumab, a checkpoint inhibitor, and zanubrutinib, a Bruton's tyrosine kinase inhibitor which became the first cancer drug developed in China to gain approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration when it received accelerated approval to treat mantle cell lymphoma in November 2019.
