Accidental Fungus Leads to 'Promising' Cancer Drug

[Guest guest]

Accidental fungus leads to promising cancer drug

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor Sun Jun 29, 6:28 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A drug developed using nanotechnology and a

fungus that contaminated a lab experiment may be broadly effective

against a range of cancers, U.S. researchers reported on Sunday.

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The drug, called lodamin, was improved in one of the last

experiments overseen by Dr. Judah Folkman, a cancer researcher who

died in January. Folkman pioneered the idea of angiogenesis therapy -

- starving tumors by preventing them from growing blood supplies.

Lodamin is an angiogenesis inhibitor that Folkman's team has been

working to perfect for 20 years. Writing in the journal Nature

Biotechnology, his colleagues say they developed a formulation that

works as a pill, without side-effects.

They have licensed it to SynDevRx, Inc, a privately held Cambridge,

Massachusetts biotechnology company that has recruited several

prominent cancer experts to its board.

Tests in mice showed it worked against a range of tumors, including

breast cancer, neuroblastoma, ovarian cancer, prostate cancer, brain

tumors known as glioblastomas and uterine tumors.

It helped stop so-called primary tumors and also prevented their

spread, Ofra Benny of Children's Hospital Boston and Harvard Medical

School and colleagues reported.

" Using the oral route of administration, it first reaches the liver,

making it especially efficient in preventing the development of

liver metastasis in mice, " they wrote in their report. " Liver

metastasis is very common in many tumor types and is often

associated with a poor prognosis and survival rate, " they added.

'ALMOST CLEAN' LIVERS

" When I looked at the livers of the mice, the treated group was

almost clean, " Benny said in a statement. " In the control group you

couldn't recognize the livers -- they were a mass of tumors. "

The drug was known experimentally as TNP-470, and was originally

isolated from a fungus called Aspergillus fumigatus fresenius.

Harvards's Ingber discovered the fungus by accident while

trying to grow endothelial cells -- the cells that line blood

vessels. The mold affected the cells in a way known to prevent the

growth of tiny blood vessels known as capillaries.

Ingber and Folkman developed TNP-470 with the help of Takeda

Chemical Industries in Japan in 1990.

But the drug affected the brain, causing depression, dizziness and

other side-effects. It also did not stay in the body long and

required constant infusions. The lab dropped it.

Efforts to improve it did not work well. Then Benny and colleagues

tried nanotechnology, attaching two " pom-pom " -shaped polymers to TNP-

470, protecting it from stomach acid.

In mice, the altered drug, now named lodamin, went straight to tumor

cells and helped suppress melanoma and lung cancer, with no apparent

side effects, Benny said.

All untreated mice had fluid in the abdominal cavity, and enlarged

livers covered with tumors. Mice treated with lodamin had normal-

looking livers and spleens, the researchers said.

Twenty days after being injected with cancer cells, four out of

seven untreated mice had died, while all treated mice were still

alive, Benny's team reported.

" I had never expected such a strong effect on these aggressive tumor

models, " she said. The researchers believe lodamin may also be

useful in other diseases marked by abnormal blood vessel growth,

such as age-related macular degeneration.

(Editing by Todd Eastham)

http://news./s/nm/20080629/ts_nm/cancer_nanoparticles_dc