Antibody Directed Gene Therapy for Breast Cancer
Abstract
Gene therapy offers an exciting new approach to treating cancer, in particular by introducing cytokine genes into tumor cells, which has been extensively studied in animal models. Ideally it would be desirable to have a reagent that could be injected into the patient and would target tumor cells. The main objective of this proposal is to develop monoclonal antibodies as cell specific targeting vectors so that they are able to bind and carry DNA into cells. The molecularly engineered antibody targeted DNA to tumor cells, but the expression of the DNA was low. Different strategies are being examined to improve the expression. The condensation of DNA has been shown to be important to efficient DNA uptake. A detailed study of conditions to achieve DNA condensation under physiological salt concentration was performed. Though DNA condensation was achieved, it did not result in an improvement. The entire domain containing the influenza hemagglutinin fusion peptide has been engineered to bind DNA in order to facilitate DNA entry into the cytoplasm. Two different strategies are being pursued to overcome the nuclear membrane barrier.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jun 01, 1999
- Accession Number
- ADA385754
Entities
Organizations
- Thomas Jefferson University