In a first! Scientists are using artificial DNA to kill cancer cells: here’s what you need to know

Researchers have found a new way to kill cancer cells using artificial DNA that could pave the way for a cure for the disease in the future. Existing cancer treatment methods have their limitations, however, scientists believe that RNA and DNA drugs could potentially help defeat the deadly disease.

Findings published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society last week show that University of Tokyo researchers used hairpin-shaped chemically synthesized cancer-fighting DNA to target and kill cervical cancer in human uterus and derived breast cancer. cells. The DNA pairs have also been used against malignant melanoma cells in mice.

The team of researchers from the University of Tokyo, led by Assistant Professor Kunihiko Morihiro and Professor Akimitsu Okamoto from the Graduate School of Engineering, said they were inspired to move away from conventional cancer drug treatments by using artificial DNA.

In particular, drugs based on nucleic acids (namely DNA and RNA) are generally not used for cancer treatments and have been difficult in the past given their difficulty in making the distinction between cancer cells and other healthy cells.

Therefore, there is a risk of negatively affecting the patient’s immune system if healthy cells are accidentally attacked. “We believed that if we could create new drugs that work by a different mechanism of action than conventional drugs, they could be effective against hitherto incurable cancers,” Okamoto said.

This led the team of researchers, for the first time, to develop the hairpin-shaped DNA strand that can activate a natural immune response to target and kill specific cancer cells.

Cancer cells can overexpress, which means making too many copies of a protein like RNA, DNA, or another substance, preventing them from functioning normally and potentially contributing to the development of cancer. Therefore, to mitigate this growth as well as prevent it, the Tokyo team created something called an artificial oncolytic which are the aforementioned DNA pairs called oHPs.

The hairpin-shaped DNA was injected into the cancer cell, subsequently the OHPs were triggered to form longer DNA strands when they encountered a microRNA called miR-21, which is overproduced in some cancers, these molecules then began to unravel and come together to create an immune system. answer. Moreover, these long strings of DNA not only killed the cancer cells, but they were also able to prevent further growth of the cancerous tissue.

OHPs typically do not form longer strands due to their curved hairpin shape, but in this case the artificial OHPs were able to overcome this limitation and opened up to combine with the target microRNA and form a bit longer. According to the study, this causes the immune system to recognize the presence of the overexpressed miR-21 as dangerous and to trigger its innate immune response which results in the death of cancer cells.

Against what type of cancers was it effective?

The study found that the assay was effective against overexpressed miR-21 found in human cervical cancer-derived cells, triple-negative human breast cancer-derived cells, and malignant melanoma-derived cells from the mouse.

In a statement, Okamoto said the formation of DNA strands due to the interaction between short DNA oHPs and overexpressed miR-21 are early examples of its use as a “selective immune amplification response that can target tumor regression”.

The researcher also noted how the interaction found by the research team provides “a new class of nucleic acid drug candidates with a completely different mechanism from known nucleic acid drugs.”

Additionally, the research is expected to transform the future of medicine through the use of a similar method to treat illnesses caused by viruses and genetic diseases. However, they still have a long way to go before the method can actually be used as a treatment and made available to the general public, but the team is confident of the benefits of nucleic acids for new drug discovery.

“The results of this study are good news for physicians, drug discovery researchers and cancer patients, as we believe it will provide them with new options for drug development and drug policy. . Then, we will aim for drug discovery based on the results of this research and examine in detail the efficacy, toxicity and potential drug delivery methods,” Okamoto noted.

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