Article - 14/09/2022

Theranostics of prostate cancer: the combination of radionuclide diagnostics and radionuclide therapy

Using a low-level radiopharmaceutical that binds to the prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA), positron emission tomography/computed tomography can be used to visualise even small prostate cancer metastases. Developed by Heidelberg researchers, the radiopharmaceutical is a modified radionuclide diagnostic agent that has been coupled with a powerful emitter and used as a therapeutic tracer to irradiate and destroy cancer cells from within.

Cancer cells often grow in environments that are low in nutrients, and they cope with this challenge by switching their metabolism to using proteins as alternative "food". Building on genetic screens, an international team of scientists could identify the protein LYSET as part of a pathway that allows cancer cells to make this switch. Their findings are now published in the journal Science.

Dossier - 08/09/2022

Imaging methods in medical diagnostics

Many different imaging methods are available these days and are used in almost all medical disciplines to visualise disease-related changes. Depending on the problem and the clinical picture, very different structural and functional parameters can be visually recorded for diagnosis and used for therapy.

Today, genome editing is almost as easy as programming software. However, the generation of viral vectors as initial material is still associated with many expensive and error-prone handling procedures. Viruses are generated via complex biological processes that have to be optimised virus-specifically in order to produce high-quality therapeutics. A new method is needed that simplifies and optimises these processes.

Tuberculosis is one of the leading causes of death worldwide, with an estimated 1.4 million deaths and ten million people infected annually. Resistant and multidrug-resistant (MDR) variants of the tuberculosis pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis pose a major threat to tuberculosis control and global health.

Changes known as epigenetic modifications play an important role in cancer development, among other things. Being able to analyze them quickly and reliably could, for example, contribute significantly to the further development of personalized therapy.

CureVac N.V., a global biopharmaceutical company developing a new class of transformative medicines based on mRNA, today announced the start of a Phase 1 study of the modified COVID-19 mRNA vaccine candidate CV0501, administered as a booster dose to previous COVID-19 vaccination. Developed in collaboration with GSK, CV0501 is based on CureVac’s second-generation mRNA backbone and is designed to specifically protect against the Omicron variant.