Medical Bulletin 27/October/2022

A paper in Cell Reports Medicine details the efficacy of H84T-BanLec against all known human-infecting coronaviruses, including MERS, the original SARS, and SARS-CoV2, including the omicron variant.

"When COVID-19 occurred, we of course wanted to study the therapy's potential and discovered it was effective against every type of coronavirus, in vitro and in vivo," study author said "Whether delivered systemically or through the nose in animal models, or prophylactically or therapeutically early on in the illness, it worked."

H84T-BanLec is derived from a lectin (a carbohydrate-binding protein) isolated from banana fruit. It accomplishes its remarkable viral-blocking abilities by binding to high-mannose glycans, polysaccharides that are present on the surface of the viruses, but only very rarely on normal healthy human cells. After binding, the virus cannot enter cells to infect them.

Reference:

David Markovitz et al,Cell Reports Medicine,DOI 10.1016/j.xcrm.2022.100774

How can drug resistance in lung cancer be reversed?

When someone is diagnosed with non-small cell lung cancer - one of two main forms of lung cancer - there is a 70-80% chance that after 14 months the cancer will develop a resistance to the drug therapy originally given to fight it. If that happens, there aren't many treatment options currently available. That's why Raghuraman Kannan, the Michael J. and Sharon R. Bukstein Chair in Cancer Research in the University of Missouri School of Medicine, is determined to find a solution.

Kannan said their approach combines a biological process called RNA interference (RNAi) with protein-based nanoparticles. The nanoparticles will help safely deliver the RNA to the cancer tumor and cause the resistance to stop. This, in turn, will allow the cancer to be more responsive to the efforts of the original drug therapy.

Reference:

Raghuraman Kannan, et al

Promising signal for the AKT inhibitor ipatasertib: NCI-MATCH cancer trial

Results from a single-arm phase 2 study of 32 patients with various cancer types harboring the rare AKT1 E17K mutation who received treatment with the oral AKT inhibitor ipatasertib in the NCI-MATCH precision medicine cancer trial are part of the 34th EORTC-NCI-AACR Symposium on Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics in Barcelona, Spain. Arm Z1K of NCI-MATCH met its primary endpoint, with ipatasertib demonstrating clinically significant activity in patients, warranting additional studies.

The primary objective of each of the 39 arms in NCI-MATCH is to determine the proportion of patients who experience an objective response, including partial or complete. Under predefined criteria, an overall response rate greater than 16% in given arm signals that the therapy warrants further study.

Arm Z1K is the second NCI-MATCH arm to explore the clinical activity of an AKT inhibitor in patients with AKT1 E17K mutations. The final results of Arm Y show that capivasertib, another orally administered AKT inhibitor, had a clinically significant objective response rate of 28.6% with AKT1 E17K-mutated metastatic tumors.

Reference:

NCI-MATCH cancer trial finds a promising signal for the AKT inhibitor ipatasertib, (2022, October 27), MEETING 34th EORTC-NCI-AACR Symposium on Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics, ECOG-ACRIN Cancer Research Group, https://ecog-acrin.org/press-release-nci-match-cancer-trial-finds-a-promising-signal-for-the-akt-inhibitor-ipatasertib/