( New scientific evidence is helping to b...)Dealing deadly cancers a knockout punch

Reovirus, a non-pathogenic virus under development at Calgary, Alberta-based Oncolytics Biotech, has shown powerful anti-cancer activity against cultured tumor cells, in animal models, and in human clinical trials. Oncolytics' proprietary reovirus formulation, Reolysin®, is active against numerous cancers, including intractable sarcomas and melanomas.

Recent studies also indicate that Reolysin works synergistically with standard anti-cancer drugs, providing significantly stronger responses than either agent alone.

In addition, other studies completed in the past year have shown Reolysin has the ability to prime patients' immune systems against their particular cancer, leading to additional cancer cell killing. It is through this second "inflammatory" mechanism that researchers hope Reolysin will bring about long-term remissions of once-untreatable cancers.

At the Fourth International Conference on Oncolytic Viruses as Cancer Therapeutics in March 2007 in Scottsdale, Arizona, several presentations focused on reovirus efficacy alone or in combination with standard chemotherapies.

In one study, investigators examined the tumor-killing ability of reovirus plus cisplatin, a standard chemotherapy agent, in a mouse melanoma model that included both cultured cells and live animals. The results of the preclinical study showed that the combination of reovirus and cisplatin was significantly more effective than cisplatin or reovirus alone at killing melanoma cancer cells in a mouse model. The investigators intend to explore the mechanism of this promising synergistic action in further detail in future preclinical work.

Another presentation at the Arizona conference reported on the use of Reolysin plus the cancer drug cyclophosphamide in an animal model of melanoma. When t
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Source:Oncolytics Biotech Inc.