Will gonorrhea come to an end?
The result of the collaboration of researchers at the University of Buffalo, working under the guidance of Professor Michael W. Russell, and the recently established biotech company TherapyX was the development of a new effective method for the treatment of gonorrhea, which is based on the approach of antitumor therapy. Experiments on mice have shown that it not only successfully eliminates the disease, but also prevents re-infection.
According to WHO statistics, more than a million cases of gonorrhea infection occur worldwide every year. This infection can be asymptomatic, but it often leads to very painful urination in men and inflammation of the pelvic organs, fraught with infertility and ectopic pregnancy, in women. The rapid spread of the disease, as well as the growing resistance of its pathogen to drugs, cause serious concerns among specialists.
As a basis for a new approach to the fight against gonorrhea, the authors took NanoCap nanoparticles developed by one of the founders of TherapyX, Professor Nejat K. Egilmez, providing gradual release of interleukin-12 – cytokine, stimulating the development of an immune response against tumors capable of suppressing immune responses directed against them.
Experiments on mice showed that intravaginal administration of interleukin-12-releasing nanospheres ensured the development of a specific adaptive immune response against the pathogen of gonorrhea Neisseria gonorrhoeae. The antibodies formed in this case led to the cure of the disease within a few days. Attempts made a month later to re-infect the animals were unsuccessful, which indicated that the mice retained the ability to fight the pathogen.
According to the authors, their proposed approach neutralizes the immunosuppressive effect of gonococci. In fact, with intravaginal administration, the interleukin-12-releasing nanospheres act as an adjuvant, turning the infection into a kind of live vaccine that prevents re-infection.
The researchers suggest that the described technique can also be used to combat other antibiotic-resistant infectious agents. In the near future, they plan to evaluate the long-term immunity formed by interleukin-12-releasing nanospheres, and eventually conduct a clinical study of the method.
Article by Yingru Liu et al. Enhancement of Adaptive Immunity to Neisseria gonorrhoeae by Local Intravaginal Administration of Microencapsulated Interleukin 12 is published in the Journal of Infectious Diseases.
Evgeniya Ryabtseva
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru based on the materials of University at Buffalo:
Novel treatment for gonorrhea acts like a “live vaccine” and prevents reinfection, UB animal study shows.
23.09.2013