New (potential) Cancer Treatment

Nanoparticles and genes used to treat cancer
Straits Times reported 14 Jun that a team of researchers from the National Cencer Centre (NCC) have turned “engineered” silica nanoparticles into tools for anti-cancer gene therapy. The engineered nanoparticles were developed by a team from NTUC School of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering. Tests showed that the nanoparticles could carry and transfer pieces of DNA to the spleen, thus causing it to produce immune cells that recognise and destroy cancer cells. The tests also showed that such gene therapy could prevent a cancer relapse. According to NCC’s Prof Hui Kam Man, the result is a more targeted and effective cancer treatment with fewer side effects. It noted that the study was funded over two years by a grant of more than $250,000 from the NMRC and the results were published in the international journal Gene Therapy last month.

'Uniquely Singapore' Dengue

The Straits Times reported 2 Jun that scientists here were stumped that uniquely Singapore strains of the dengue virus seemed to have risen here and that young adults were most hit by the fever. It noted that early results from an ongoing islandwide study showed that the strains of the virus circulating here could be evolving differently from those in other parts of the region. It quoted Dr Martin Hibberd, a dengue researcher and associate director of infectious diseases at the Genome Institute of Singapore, saying, "It's possible that almost all the strains we see now are found exclusively in Singapore". Preliminary findings of the Early Dengue (Eden) infection and outcome study suggested that young adults here - those over 21 - were more often victims of the disease than their counterparts in other Asian countries where the disease was endemic. In Indonesia and India, for example, dengue victims were much younger - children. The report added that in the region, the chance of meeting an infected Aedes mosquito carrying the virus was once every six months whereas here, because of stringent vector control, the chance of getting bitten by an infected mosquito was about once every 10 years, "a statistical rarity", according to Dr Hibberd.

How is that for a dose of "Uniquely Singapore?"