SynBio8: SynBio and Cancer treatment (v1.0)

There were about 10 million deaths worldwide due to cancer in 2020 making it one in six deaths. Cancer is a particularly potent cause of death in richer countries where other causes like infectious diseases and maternal mortality have been significantly reduced. The rise in global cancer deaths is driven by two demographic changes: population growth and population ageing. There are many types of cancer. The key conventional treatments have been Chemotherapy, Radiation therapy and Bone Marrow transplants. SynBio has started to offer clues and new potential answers to the scrouge of cancer. Immunotherapies are emerging. 

SynBio can be used to reprogram a patient's own T-cells to target cancer cells. FDA approved two such therapies for blood cancer in 2017. In CAR T-cell therapy (chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy), T-cells are obtained from the patient's blood. CAR T-cells are then made in the lab. Millions of them are then grown. CAR T-cells are then infused into the patent. The CAR T-cells binds to the cancer and kills them. The result of this treatment has been shown to be extremely promising. In research, adaptations have been made to avoid damaging healthy tissues to apply this to a cancer like brain blastoma tumor. 

Virotherapy is another type of immunotherapy. Scientists have known that viral infections can influence cancer and trigger remissions. Doctors had crafted various ways to use viruses to treat cancer. Armed with designer viruses with SynBio, new doors were opened. In Oncolytic biotherapy, engineered viruses are built to attack cancer cells and tumors. Viruses enter the cancer cells and replicate themselves. It causes cancerous host cells to slow. It also spreads chemicals that alert T-cells. This treatment often is combined with other more traditional treatments. In 2015 a modified herpes virus was the first approved by the FDA for clinical use. This type of treatment must balance viral attack on the cancer with how the body's own immune system interacts with the virus and the cancer cell. 

The use of bacteria to treat cancer is not a new idea. More recently, bacteria-based therapy is in the middle of a Renaissance. There are lots of bacteria naturally in our body. An example is gut bacteria. In the past decade, bacteria-based cancer immunotherapy has attracted much attention in the academic circle due to its unique mechanism and abundant applications in triggering the host and anti-tumor immunity. One advantage of bacteria lies in their capability in targeting tumors and preferentially colonizing the core area of the tumor. Bacteria living inside a tumor would directly disrupt cancer cells.  Synthetic bacteria can be engineered to enhance this treatment by taking advantage of the natural pathways of bacteria in our bodies, while also increasing the safety and applicability of this type of treatment. This has entered the clinical trial phase. 

Vaccine therapy is a new technique being developed in the lab to target tumors. An example is a study in 2021 by Chinese scientists. Scientists in this study created a hydrogel containing mRNA that was packed into nano particles and injected into melanoma in mice. The hydrogel allows a slower release of the mRNA over a period of 30 days. The mRNA enters the cancer cells. The mRNA creates a protein that paints a target on the cancer cell. T-cells can then identify these cells and generate an immune response by attacking them.

The research goes on and these immunotherapies are very promising.