C10569: Molecular Target to Diagnose & Treat Pancreatic Cancer & Methods to Identify New Targets Value Proposition: ADVANTAGES
• Diagnostic and therapeutic target for pancreatic cancer
• Molecular target to develop vaccines and antagonistic antibodies for therapy and prevention
• Confirmed T cell response for robust, diverse, and long-lasting anti-tumor immunity
• Application to address and decrease the 90% mortality rate through early detection and treatment
• Large diagnostic and prognostic market
Technical Details:
BACKGROUND
Pancreatic cancer is a malignant tumor of the pancreas. Each year ~250,000 people worldwide and ~ 38,000 in the US are diagnosed with this condition. Unfortunately more than 90% of pancreatic cancer patients die within one year of diagnosis and $1.5 billion is spent on treatment of pancreatic cancer in the United States each year.
Pancreatic cancer is sometimes called a "silent killer" because early pancreatic cancer often does not cause symptoms, and the later symptoms are usually non-specific and varied. There is a persistent and continuing need to understand the genetic make-up, genes and pathways that are relevant to pancreatic cancer. Such information would be critical to help advance pancreatic cancer research specifically technologies for early diagnosis and treatment of this most deadly disease.
TECHNOLOGY
Johns Hopkins University scientists have developed a method to identify tumor antigens from the sera of cancer patients and utilizing this method have identified a therapeutic target of cancer including but not limited to pancreatic cancer. The identified target is an overexpressed cancer associated protein that causes a malignant phenotype and facilitates metastasis by translocating to the cell surface. It is recognized by both B cell and T cell responses and mediates the epithelial mesenchymal transition involved in cancer’s metastatic process. These finding suggests the protein is an ideal target for therapeutic intervention.
Looking for Partners:
Commercially, this technology can be developed into a vaccine, cancer diagnostic kit/assay or assay to identify novel antigens. Specifically, a robust high-throughput assay to identify tumor antigens from cancer patients and subsequently utilize identified antigens to develop therapies for cancer, diagnostic methods and kits for pancreatic cancers, and finally, vaccination against epitopes present in pancreatic cancer could lead to prevention of development, or reversal of progression of a tumor, or even reduction and elimination of an established tumor.
