Potent anti-cancer therapy created using ’click chemistry’

Stock illustration of T cells attacking a cancer cell A potent anti-cancer therapy has been created using Nobel prize-winning "click chemistry", where molecules click together like LEGO bricks, in a new study by UCL and Stanford researchers. The study, published in Nature Chemistry , opens up new possibilities for how cutting-edge cancer immunotherapies might be built in future. The research team created an anti-cancer therapy with three components: one targeting the cancer cell, another recruiting a white blood cell called a T cell to attack the cancer cell, and a third knocking out part of the cancer cell's defences. Previously, this type of three-component therapy has only been built using a complex process called protein engineering, in which DNA sequences for multiple proteins are combined and inserted into a single cell. One of the three-component therapies the researchers built, which used an enzyme called sialidase to strip away sugars that the cancer cell uses to hide itself, was especially effective at killing breast cancer cells in a dish. The researchers said this showed that the enzyme - which only recently started being explored in cancer research - has the potential to be the basis of next-generation anti-cancer agents. First author Dr Peter Szijj (UCL Chemistry) said: "Click chemistry is a quicker and more adaptable way to build these multifunctional anti-cancer agents than protein engineering.