Testing a method of treating lung cancer with stem cells.

British scientists are pioneering trials of lung cancer treatment using stem cells.

British scientists are pioneering trials of stem cell therapy for lung cancer, offering new hope for patients unfortunate enough to suffer from one of the most dangerous forms of cancer.

In the new treatment method, researchers use genetically modified stem cells from bone marrow to find and destroy cancer cells.

The advantage of this method is that the cells do not need to be a tight match to the patient's cell type and genetic profile. Scientists can simply obtain them from a readily available source of donated bone marrow.

The stem cells are then modified to activate an anti-cancer gene called "Trail," which is normally active in immune cells. These modified cells are highly attractive to cancerous tumors, and once they "find" a tumor, they create a "suicide trail" within the cancerous cells.

Experiments on mice showed that this treatment completely eliminated or significantly reduced the tumors in the mice.

A new trial of lung cancer treatment using stem cells will begin with 56 patients early next year. All of these patients will have been diagnosed with metastatic lung cancer, and conventional treatments are not expected to prolong their lives by more than a few months.

The trial, funded by the Medical Research Council, comes amid growing research into cell-based treatments aimed at improving remission rates and extending patients' lives.

In the US and the UK, trials of treating leukemia with genetically modified immune cells have also shown promising results.

Professor Sam Janes, who led the research at University College London (UCL) Hospital, said that cancer treatment needs new approaches in addition to chemotherapy, which is less effective and only provides short-term results. This will be the world's first trial using stem cells to treat lung cancer.

Each year in the UK, more than 40,000 people are diagnosed with lung cancer, and only 5% of them have a chance of surviving for 10 years after diagnosis.

According to Vietnam+