Pembrolizumab is given as a 30-minute infusion every three weeks for a year. While the patient waits for their personalized vaccine, they start taking the drug pembrolizumab (brand name Keytruda), made by Merck, which unleashes the immune system to attack cancer. Eliav Barr, chief medical officer of Merck, which supported the trial.Įach vaccine takes about eight weeks to manufacture and is based on tumor cells removed during surgery. Researchers aren't sure how many neoantigens to target or which are likely to offer the most benefit, "so we cram in as many potential neoantigens as possible," said Dr. The mRNA vaccine is then designed to target 34 of these distinctive proteins, getting the immune system to recognize them and hopefully kill the cells that make them without damaging healthy tissue.īecause there are so many possible neoantigens, resulting from a patient's own genetics and the evolution of their tumor cells, the vaccine must be bespoke, designed specifically for each person. These vaccines are designed to prevent cancer recurrences, not an initial run-in with the disease.Īfter surgical removal of a tumor or a separate biopsy, scientists send a sample of tissue and blood for genetic sequencing, looking for proteins that are unique to the cancer and not present in healthy tissue. Graphic explainer: How mRNA vaccines work How would an mRNA cancer vaccine work? "You have to prove it in melanoma before you try it in other cancers." Rodabe Amaria, a melanoma oncologist at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, who was not involved in the study. "No cancer is as immunotherapy sensitive as melanoma is," said Dr. The next one to be tested will be non-small-cell lung cancer, which kills about 100,000 Americans a year.īut it made sense to try first in melanoma. The pandemic proved that mRNA vaccines, already in development for cancer, could be used safely and developed quickly, said Vonderheide, who also directs the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania.īenefits seen in melanoma, a cancer known to be controlled by the immune system, are likely to hold up in other cancers that are affected by the immune system, he and several other experts said. Robert Vonderheide, who was not involved in the study but is the program committee chair of the American Association for Cancer Research's annual meeting, where the study was presented. "This represents a big shift in how we're using cancer vaccines," said Dr. Instead of using a vaccine to try to prevent or shrink a tumor, the new mRNA vaccines are aimed at reducing the chances of a high-risk cancer recurring. Ryan Sullivan, an oncologist at Mass General Cancer Center, who was a co-author on the study. "It's probably the first real data that suggests that this personalized approach to vaccination may be worth exploring further," said Dr. If the results hold up in a larger, longer study planned to start later this year, it will mark a dramatic turnaround for cancer vaccines, which have been tested and failed for decades. The study, presented Sunday at a research conference, showed that after nearly two years, patients who received a personalized mRNA vaccine made by Moderna and Merck were 44% more likely to be alive and avoid new tumors than those who received only the standard of care. Now a new study suggests specially designed mRNA shots can help prevent recurrences of melanoma, a dreaded skin cancer. The vaccine technology America learned about during the pandemic was originally aimed at cancer, but its use against infectious diseases took off in the pandemic. Messenger RNA vaccines aren't just for COVID anymore. Watch Video: How the new RNA technology is used to create the COVID-19 vaccines
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