Progress toward immunotherapy treatments for melanoma advanced another step with near-unanimous support from FDA advisors for Amgen Inc’s talimogene laherparepvec (T-VEC). An oncolytic virus immunotherapy, T-VEC has been developed for patients with injectable regionally or distantly metastatic melanoma. If approved, it will be the first product in a new class of drugs, oncolytic immunotherapies.
MRV Research
Immunotherapy drug combination is proven safe and effective in metastatic melanoma tumors
Researchers have extended the reach of the immune system in the fight against metastatic melanoma, this time by combining the checkpoint inhibitor tremelimumab with an anti-CD40 monoclonal antibody drug. The first-of-its-kind study found the dual treatments to be safe and elicit a clinical response in patients, according to new results from a phase I trial. This was presented at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting 2015 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Scientists uncover new pharmaceutical strategy for treating melanoma
Scientists looking to better understand the mechanisms behind the origin and spread of melanoma tumors have uncovered a possible role for a decades-old antibacterial agent in treating these aggressive and increasingly common cancers. In findings reported in the journal Cell Death and Differentiation, the researchers demonstrate that a particular enzyme, guanosine monophosphate synthase (GMPS), drives melanoma growth, and propose a new pharmaceutical strategy for targeting that protein.
Study Finds New Potential Melanoma Drug Target
UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers have identified a possible new drug target for a potentially deadly form of skin cancer that, when blocked in a pre-clinical study in mice, reduced the cancer’s growth.