Research Institute for Basic Science Development of New Treatment Using Gene Scissors
[아시아경제 김봉수 기자] A patient-specific anticancer treatment has been developed that uses gene scissors to select and kill cancer cells without damaging normal cells.
The Institute for Basic Science (IB Young) announced on the 23rd that the Genome Homeostasis Research Center has developed a cancer treatment ‘CINDELA (Cancer specific INDEL Attacker)’ that can be applied to all types of cancer without side effects.
Existing chemotherapy using radiation and chemotherapy causes serious side effects such as hair loss and diarrhea. This is because it damages not only cancer cells but also the DNA double helix of normal cells. On the other hand, Syndela technology can kill cancer cells without affecting normal cells by selecting and cutting the mutant DNA double helix that exists only in cancer cells with CRISPR-Cas9 gene scissors.
The research team confirmed that cutting the DNA double helix using gene scissors (protein enzyme) can induce cancer cell death similar to the physical and chemical DNA double helix cutting using radiation or chemical anticancer drugs. Then, through bioinformatics analysis, they found ‘insertion/deletion (InDel) mutations’ unique to several cancer cell lines (breast cancer, colon cancer, leukemia, and glioblastoma) that are not found in normal cells. The CRISPR-Cas9 gene scissors targeting this were produced and applied to mouse experiments, demonstrating that only cancer cells can be selectively killed without affecting normal cells. The more the InDel mutant DNA double helix was cut with the Syndela technology, the greater the cancer cell killing effect. Furthermore, it has been proven that it can also inhibit the growth of cancer cells.
There have been studies on cancer treatment using gene scissors in the past, but there is a limit to inefficiency. The process was complicated and took a long time because it was a method of finding cancer-inducing mutations, revealing various causes, and producing gene scissors that return them to normal. However, Syndela technology kills cancer cells by cutting the DNA double helix of the InDel mutation, which is generated in common in all cancer formation processes, and preventing DNA damage repair. In short, they produced cancer treatment gene scissors that can be directly applied to all cancers regardless of the mutational characteristics of cancer cells.
Director Myung Kyung-jae said, “We have developed a patient-specific precision medical platform technology that has no side effects and can be applied to all cancers. He added, “Currently, we are conducting an experiment to treat cancer cells collected from cancer patients with the Syndella technology, and we will focus on follow-up research to improve technology efficiency and commercialize it.”
The results of this study were published on the 22nd in the online version of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), an international academic journal.
By Kim Bong-su, staff reporter bskim@asiae.co.kr
