Emerging Cancer Therapy

Today, treatment options for cancer patients typically include surgery, radiation therapy, immunotherapy, and chemotherapy. While these therapies have saved lives and reduced pain and suffering, cancer still takes millions of lives every year around the world. In recent years, researchers have been working on a new strategy: developing microbes and microbial products that specifically attack cancer cells.

This book breaks new ground in emerging cancer treatment modalities by presenting recent advances in the use of microorganisms and viruses as well as their products in cancer therapy. Seventeen chapters review the application of live microorganisms, high and low molecular weight products derived from microorganisms, and microbial products fused to cancer-targeting molecules. In addition, the book highlights the benefits of a multi-target approach to destroy cancer cells. Readers will not only discover the results and significance of basic and clinical research, but also encouraging results from clinical trials.

Emerging Cancer Therapy is divided into three sections:

• Section 1: Live/Attenuated Bacteria and Viruses as Anticancer Agents

• Section 2: Bacterial Products as Anticancer Agents

• Section 3: Patents on Bacteria/Bacterial Products as Anticancer Agents

With chapters written by leading pioneers in microbial, biotech, and cancer research, Emerging Cancer Therapy is recommended for biotechnologists, microbiologists, clinical oncologists, medicinal chemists, and biochemists. Readers will not only learn the tremendous potential of microbial and biotechnological approaches to cancer therapy, but also discover new directions of research for effective drug discovery and development.

ARSÉNIO FIALHO, PhD, is Associate Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering and Principal Investigator for the Institute of Biotechnology and Bioengineering in the Instituto Superior Técnico at the Universidade Técnica de Lisboa, Portugal. His current scientific interests are focused on the study of bacterial proteins, such as azurin and Laz, as novel multi-targeted drug candidates with anticancer activities. He is the author or coauthor of more than fifty papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals and, during the last four years, became the holder of five U.S. patents. Dr. Fialho teaches courses in biochemistry, molecular biology, and bioinformatics.

ANANDA CHAKRABARTY, PhD, is Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Chicago. In addition to more than 250 research publications, he has secured nine U.S. patents during the last four years on azurin and Laz, two bacterial proteins with anticancer, anti-viral and anti-parasitic activities. He also is the recipient of a patent on the first life form, a genetically manipulated pseudomonad designed to degrade multiple hydrocarbons present in crude oil, as decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1980 in the celebrated court case Diamond v. Chakrabarty.